Head over to Settings > Security > Encryption. WARNING: Encrypting your phone is irreversible! Make sure you really want to do this before proceeding. If you don’t want to download an app, you can actually protect yourself with Android’s built-in encryption tool. However, once new data is written over the deleted data, the deleted data is gone forever.Īvast! Anti-Theft works by overwriting deleted data with random data, making it unrecoverable. This is how data recovery software is able to find your accidentally deleted files. When you delete a file on your device, it isn’t really gone until you write something else over it. I reached out to avast! for further clarification but am still waiting for a response.

It’s unclear how this differs from Android’s built-in Device Manager app. You can use the app’s “Thorough wipe” feature to wipe your phone before selling it. avast! Anti-Theft is available from Google Play and can find and control your lost or stolen phone remotely. Of course, avast! has a product that promises to wipe your device completely. The program it used is called FTK Imager from AccessData. avast! claims it was able to use “simple and easily available recovery software” to restore deleted files.

While most users have the foresight to wipe their devices before selling, performing a factory reset isn’t enough.

How to restore avast deleted files