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Washington Post Raid Is a Frightening Reminder: Turn Off Your Phone’s Biometrics Now
(theintercept.com)
this post was submitted on 30 Jan 2026
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Privacy
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Or at the very least; turn your phone entirely off (shutdown) whenever you expect or encounter police contact.
Biometrics only work when the device is already running. Mobile devices are in their most locked down/secure state when 'at rest', ie shutdown.
In android; there is also a 'lockdown' mode you can quickly activate from the power off screen, that disables Biometrics until next unlock with a pin/pattern, but doesn't fully shutdown so you can still quickly access things like the camera. This has to be explicitly enabled in settings first and will not offer much protection from various lockscreen bypass software available to law enforcement.
Five clicks of the lock button on an iPhone will force a password or pin to enable biometrics again.
You should always turn off / reboot your phone if you expect it to be potentially be taken
Simply being locked after being unlocked once leaves the phone in a less secure state than if it was fully off or just rebooted and never unlocked.
If you need your phone to record the interaction, then you might only get as far as locking it, but always strive to shut it down.
Also, don't take your phone to protests. ACAB.
Wear clothing that can't identify you. Hide tattoos and anything that might make you stand out. Get clothes from a free giveaway place, without cameras. Walk a bit differently if you need to.
Cover your face and cover surveillance cameras, or break them, or hack them (do the latter two only if you know what you're doing).
Wear a body cam. Get bear and pepper spray. Pigs can fucking get it.
Bicycles don't have license plates if you need a faster way.
For the clothing thing, it should be enough to buy from a thrift store. Just pay with cash to be safe. Although if you're planning to do something that'll make you of particular interest this may not be enough. Thrift stores do have cameras, and the police could theoretically look for a particular set of clothing being purchased. Its incredibly unlikely and would take a ridiculous amount of effort, but it is possible.
I've been debating buying a burner phone for protests, leaving my main phone elsewhere, and only powering on the burner when it's needed. Probably the only way to bring a phone to a protest.
Buy an older pixel and install Graphene
Keep it off/in a faraday bag at all times, never turn it on at home. Go to elsewhere to set it up.
If they REALLY want you, you will get got.
But there's no reason to make it easy.
You can also buy faraday bags, if you want a phone available but not online. But it's still there physically so burner would still be a good choice.
Just test it first. I got a faraday bag of Amazon and it didn't work.
100%. I tested mine with calls and making sure the wifi and Bluetooth didn't go through.
On iOS, with a locked device, quickly press the lock button five times to do the same, it should bring up the power off/SOS screen, which you can dismiss.
This can also be done by holding down both power and volume up buttons for a few seconds.
TIL thanks!!!
2 things. Unless I accidentally enabled this setting, it's on by default. And what do you mean by lockscreen bypass software. What would be the point of lockdown if its not effective against law enforcement trying to brute force your privacy?
It may well be on by default now. I just know I had to enable it the last time I looked at this.
Tools such as those provided by Cellebrite and similar.
Lockdown mode is mainly to disable biometrics, to prevent someone on the street forcibly using them to unlock your device. It's not going to stop an entire agency with more sophisticated tools.