My phone got weirdly hot in a coffee shop and I found out why

I was working at a cafe in Austin last month, and my phone started getting really warm in my pocket for no reason. I pulled it out and saw the battery was draining super fast, like 20% in maybe 15 minutes. I got a bad feeling, so I opened my settings and saw a ton of data being sent to an app I didn't recognize. I immediately turned off the wifi and my mobile data right there at the table. When I got home, I did a factory reset because I couldn't trust it. I think I must have clicked a bad link earlier that day that installed something nasty. It was a huge pain to set everything up again, but better safe than sorry. Has anyone else had to do a full reset over something like a weird app they didn't install?

3 comments

3 Comments

wader717d ago

Yeah @the_robin, that "what data it was sending" part is the real kicker. I used to just close weird pop-ups and keep going, but after my buddy had his banking info stolen from a sketchy app, I changed my tune. Now I check my app list every week and delete anything I don't remember installing, no questions asked.

the_robin7d ago

That sounds super sketchy. Did you ever figure out what the app was called or what it was trying to do? I'd be paranoid about what data it was sending out before you cut it off.

wood.uma7d ago

Check the app's hidden permissions, @the_robin, because sometimes they want your mic or camera.