Was I hacked?

[SpyderTracks]

I thought you meant backup to iCloud and then wipe the phone and restore it??

No, I said you should set all your apps to be backed up to cloud storage. You can set individual things like messages and stuff to back up to cloud so that you never have to worry about doing a clean install.

Restoring an icloud backup is just flashing a backup of the exact same image that you've just wiped. Kinda defeats the object.

 

[marklcfc]

What exactly am I supposed to do then to wipe the phone and get my messages, whatsapp photos and notes back safely?

 

[SpyderTracks]

What exactly am I supposed to do then to wipe the phone and get my messages, whatsapp photos and notes back safely?

Just have the apps set to backup to cloud. Then wipe the phone, log in and it should automatically restore everything.

 

[Bhuna50]

On your phone, in Settings go to your iCloud account - will be labelled your name probably and have Apple ID, icloud, media and purchases written under it.

Then go to iCloud

Here you have a list of items / Apps using iCloud - ensure what you want to back up is selected so things like

Photos > On.
Contacts - switched on
Calendars - switched on
Messages - on
then go down the list of the apps.

This will back up the individual items to the icloud.

Your phone will then sync these with the icloud so when you wipe the phone off you should not need to do a restore from a back up image but it will likely ask you to sync those apps with cloud again.

 

[Martinr36]

What exactly am I supposed to do then to wipe the phone and get my messages, whatsapp photos and notes back safely?

For whatsapp just set it back up like you did in the first place & it should download all your chats from backup

 

[marklcfc]

Just have the apps set to backup to cloud. Then wipe the phone, log in and it should automatically restore everything.

So when its reset, I have alot of alot of options like these what do I do?

Your phone will then sync these with the icloud so when you wipe the phone off you should not need to do a restore from a back up image but it will likely ask you to sync those apps with cloud again.

I'm still confused how I get them all back when I'm not restoring from icloud backup. At what point does the messages come back?

 

[marklcfc]

Don't worry its doing it I think, I didn't know it would work that way. I just have to download the apps I want again

 

[Bhuna50]

dont install the back up - load up as if new, reinstall the apps from the store and then it should - if it was cloud synced before - sync with the data on the cloud.

 

[ubuysa]

I would reinstall the phone also just to be sure.

Also enable 2fa on everything and don’t use text for 2fa, use an app manager like Microsoft Authenticator, works with any account.

I don't believe that's entirely accurate. I did some research on these authenticator apps a few months ago when I was considering using one. As far as I can establish (because I'm no expert in this field) these apps will work with any account that uses TOTP* - the Time-based One Time Password standard. I know that Microsoft accounts use TOTP as do many others apparently. However, banking and many other financial apps (even Twitter apparently) use HOTP - the HMAC-based One Time Password standard and these authenticator apps cannot use HOTP.

*TOTP will always be an acronym for Top Of The Pops to me.

 

[SpyderTracks]

I don't believe that's entirely accurate. I did some research on these authenticator apps a few months ago when I was considering using one. As far as I can establish (because I'm no expert in this field) these apps will work with any account that uses TOTP* - the Time-based One Time Password standard. I know that Microsoft accounts use TOTP as do many others apparently. However, banking and many other financial apps (even Twitter apparently) use HOTP - the HMAC-based One Time Password standard and these authenticator apps cannot use HOTP.

*TOTP will always be an acronym for Top Of The Pops to me.

I don't know of any UK bank than uses a generic 2fa, the ones that do have their own little code generator boxes that get sent from the bank, maybe that's what TOTP refers to?

But yes, not banks.

 

[ubuysa]

I don't know of any UK bank than uses a generic 2fa, the ones that do have their own little code generator boxes that get sent from the bank, maybe that's what TOTP refers to?

I would assume so, though I think that's HTOP.

Why aren't standards....well....standard?

 

[SpyderTracks]

I would assume so, though I think that's HTOP.

Why aren't standards....well....standard?

It is annoying isn't it.

I guess I can understand it with banking apps, for the added security they have something that's entirely offline so reduces the "hacking" chances exponentially unless someone reverse engineers the code box and breaks the algorythm in that.... I'm sure that's pretty challenging though and someone would have done it by now if it were at all easy.

 

[marklcfc]

I wish I knew how this actually happened because I can changed 100 passwords and reinstall computer/phone but I still don't know how it came to happen.
And it wasn't like it was the same combination, three of the sites used the same combination but the Amazon site used a completely different email and password.

 

[Bhuna50]

I wish I knew how this actually happened because I can changed 100 passwords and reinstall computer/phone but I still don't know how it came to happen.
And it wasn't like it was the same combination, three of the sites used the same combination but the Amazon site used a completely different email and password.

Sadly you may never know but now that you have changed all your passwords, added 2FA, using a password manager etc, you have gone about it the right way to ensure it does not happen again as best as you can.

 

[marklcfc]

Sadly you may never know but now that you have changed all your passwords, added 2FA, using a password manager etc, you have gone about it the right way to ensure it does not happen again as best as you can.

I am using lastpass but still need to store these passwords for reference, as I can't remember all these random passwords. Whats the best way of doing this. I have them on my phone presently, as a note file. But I was wondering whether to put them on a usb drive instead. Or another way?

 

[Martinr36]

I am using lastpass but still need to store these passwords for reference, as I can't remember all these random passwords. Whats the best way of doing this. I have them on my phone presently, as a note file. But I was wondering whether to put them on a usb drive instead. Or another way?

I used to know someone who had all her passwords written down in a physical notebook

 

[Bhuna50]

Sadly you may never know but now that you have changed all your passwords, added 2FA, using a password manager etc, you have gone about it the right way to ensure it does not happen again as best as you can.

Sorry - I dont know how lastpass works but I use roboform and when I want to know a password or remind myself of a password I just open it from either my iphone or laptop and key in the master key password to access it - i can then look up my password I wanted and only have to remember one password for the whole lot. it remains protected then and not in an open txt file that if someone had access to it would be all my passwords gone and needing resetting again.

The master key password is something memorable to me but something that would take a long time for any programs to crack but as I only need to remember one password then I have no problem with it...

Also with the iphone, I just use my fingerprint now to unlock it

 

[marklcfc]

Decided to print them all off, now they don't exist anywhere apart from in Lastpass.

 

[ubuysa]

Unfortunately most security breaches are the result of human error. My best guess would be a successful phishing attack that perhaps loaded malware on your PC and which harvested passwords.

Regardless of whatever security you put in place the weak link is always going to be the users.

 

[Bhuna50]

Unfortunately most security breaches are the result of human error. My best guess would be a successful phishing attack that perhaps loaded malware on your PC and which harvested passwords.

Regardless of whatever security you put in place the weak link is always going to be the users.

What a polite way of putting “you fooked up”.

[emoji23][emoji23]


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