How to keep your Lumia safe and secure

October marks National Cyber Security Awareness Month (NCSAM), which is about raising awareness of online safety and educating people about the best ways to create a safer digital world.

Since it is our shared responsibility, let’s talk about smartphone safety. 

Although your Lumia smartphone running on Windows Phone 8.1 is very secure, here are five tips on how to safeguard your Lumia experience even further.

Lock your Lumia

It is always better to be safe than be sorry, so make it a habit to password-protect your Lumia. In fact, you can also put a lock on your SIM card, thereby preventing misuse.

Of course, use a strong password like a combination of numbers that mean something to you. It is recommended not to use your birth date, phone number or your national identification number.

Activate “find my phone”

Your Lumia comes with a built-in “find my phone” feature under the settings option. Turn this on and this genius feature will help you locate your Lumia — whether it’s been misplaced somewhere in the house, or whether it’s been really stolen.

This free service (try here) can ring, lock, locate the phone on a map or erase data from your Lumia—all remotely from your web browser.

Note: this feature requires your phone to be connected to a network.

Update regularly 

When you see a notification for an “update” or an app that needs attention, accept and install updates offered for both the phone itself and the apps on it. We recommend doing this to ensure you always have the most recent version of security in your Lumia.

Protect your privacy

Avoid using Wi-Fi connections in public locations, such as cafés and airports, especially when conducting bank or other financial transactions, as privacy and security can be minimal. It’s safer to use your own data connection, which encrypts data as it is transmitted.

Additionally, avoid saving user names or passwords in your mobile browsers and apps or financial services that offer to save your sensitive data.

Back up your data

Your Lumia running Windows Phone 8.1 can automatically save your phone settings, text messages, photos, and videos to OneDrive, thereby offering you a complete backup. So ensure you have turned on the “back up” my phone feature and monitor the process regularly.

And for those of you who love using Office 365 on your Lumia phones, here’s how you can add multi-factor authentication for Office 365 and keep your files secure.

How do you keep your Lumia secure?