Its not every day that our blog team get’s to write about television. Luckily for us though, a series has come out with some surprisingly realistic hackery going on, here are our thoughts on it.
While we appreciate the show researching and using real spy software, FlexiSPY was being implemented in a cloak and dagger way. Because of this, we feel that now is a good time to say again that you should always check with your local laws before installing FlexiSPY onto any phone. We also recommend that you have a read of our legal disclaimerto ensure the use of our software for your intended purpose is legal.
Nevertheless, it is cool to see television shows putting a more realistic spin on what spy technology can do, and we hope that this trend continues!
If you are interested in this sort of thing, you can read more about our software through our website by clicking here.
Just a few hours after 8.4 was released, news broke out that an official iOS 84 Jailbreak was available, made possible by the Jailbreak team TaiG.
Immediately after being released, our iOS developers were hard at work integrating FlexiSPY with the jailbreak, and now they’ve done it, FlexiSPY now supports iOS 8.4, and you are now safe to update the iOS device to this version.
Update now or risk being stuck
While jailbreaking is perfectly legal, and will not brick your device in any way, Apple likes to keep things locked down. Based on their past efforts to prevent jailbreaking, it is likely that they will soon make another update to iOS, an update which will render the jailbreak null.
Once Apple pushes a new iOS release, and if you update to that release, expect to be stuck with an un-jailbreakable device for 3-6 months, and of course, if you want to run FlexiSPY on an iPhone or iPad, it must be jailbroken first, which we’ve written a guide for.
Once you’ve taken care of the jailbreak, you can go ahead and re-install FlexiSPY or install for the first time, which you can do by purchasing a license on our site, here
Important update: on May 28th, mSpy temporarily re-enabled the feature for their app to be either visible or hidden.
Hot on the heels of the story that Mspy had been hacked, our competitive analysis made another important discovery.
Mspy no longer allows you to hide the Mspy phone application, making it complete visible to the person that is using it.
There is nothing wrong with this at all – after all, a parent may want to let their child know that they are being monitored, and an employer should make it clear to their employees that they are spying on them.
Our team first discovered this change on May 25th, when after doing our routine competitor analysis tests, we realized that the Mspy app was visible on our test phones, and that it had lost the ability to become hidden.
Earlier versions of Mspy used to provide an option inside their control panel to allow the parent or employer to make the visibility choice. We have now confirmed that Mspy have removed this option.
To make changing to FlexiSPY easier for unhappy Mspy customers, we would like to point out that we have a Trade In Offer, where you can recoup some of your losses against a copy of FlexiSPY.
3 years after mSpy was hacked, and their customer data leaked on the web, it is reported by KrebsonSecurity that millions of sensitive mSpy records have been leaked online — this time due to a security researcher discovering an unsecured mSpy database.
While not technically a hack, it is still disturbing nonetheless, especially as it is alleged that that mSpy ignored warnings from the security researcher, and in fact blocked further communication with the researcher after attempts were made to contact mSpy’s head of security.
We at FlexiSPY understand that no system is 100% invulnerable from attackers, however we are grateful that through our efforts like introducing a bug bounty program, 2FA, and performing extensive security audits, unlike competitors — none of our customer data has ever been leaked online.
Finally, in light of this news, we would like to again extend an offer to mSpy customers who are worried about the safety of their data.
If you are an mSpy customer, we will offer a trade in discount if you purchase FlexiSPY. Find out more here.
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Original article:
If you are an mSpy customer, you will no doubt have heard that mSpy has been hacked, and you are probably worried about the possibility that your information is available on the Darknet for download
Getting hacked is terrible, but in defense of mSpy, this happens to many companies, regardless of the security precautions they take. And before the mainstream media starts to get glib and judgmental because they don’t like the idea of monitoring, lets not forget that Visa and MasterCard have been hacked, and their customers details sold to identity thieves.
With the information currently available, it seems likely the breach was carried out by an insider. Going by the reported acrimony between the two co founders, one could speculate that it was an inside job, and not a hack or technology security breach.
While we take no pleasure in mSpy being hacked and we condemn the people involved, we understand that mSpy customers may be worried about their monitoring data.
Therefore, we are offering mSpy customers a discount on a copy of FlexiSPY. If you are a mSpy customer, we will offer a trade in discount if you purchase FlexiSPY. Find out more here.
This bug is exploited by means of just a WiFi connection and will put your iOS device into a never-ending bootloop for as long as you are in range of the malicious WiFi connection. -nice going, Apple-
“It puts the victim’s device in an unusable state for as long as the attack impacts a device. Even if victims understand that the attack comes from a Wi-Fi network, they can’t disable the Wi-Fi interface in the repeated restart state.” -Skycure
Attackers can fairly easily weaponize a WiFi network through use of a modified SSH certificate which, when your iOS device attempts to parse it, starts the bootloop.
So, the only way that iOS device owners would be able to stop the bootloop would be to get out of range of the malicios WiFi network.
How To Protect Against The No iOS Zone
Below, you’ll find the advise that the original discoveres of the vulnerability have given for avoiding the problem alltogether.
1. In general, everyone should be avoiding connecting to any suspicious “FREE” Wi-Fi network.
2. Update your iOS device to 8.1.3, as the attack is sometimes not as effective on this version.
3. If you are able to get to the WiFi settings toggle before the next crash, try to disconnect from the WiFi network or just turn your phone to airplane mode altogether.
Ultimately Apple are the ones that need to come up with a fix quickly, and as of the time of this posting, they have yet to disclose when this will be patched.
Over 650,000 ADSL routers that are extremely vulnerable to hacking have been ousted to the public by ISP’s worldwide.
Of the numerous exposed flaws, one of the largest appears to be a directory traversal vulnerability which exists under a component under the name of webproc.cgi. This vulnerability allows hackers to gain access to admin credentials, potentially letting them steal data that’s important to the victim.
Perhaps the most astounding part of this story though, is that that researchers first discovered, and exposed this flaw back in 2011 but in only a select few models.
More recently though, a lone security researcher, Kyle Lovett, while analyzing some ADSL routers, uncovered this vulnerability in a huge amount of routers. After further investigation he ended up uncovering hundreds of thousands of susceptible devices located around the world.
Just taking a wild guess, this happened on such a large scale, and the problem was swept aside so long because of the ISP’s.
Most ISP’s provide customers (force them into using) their own ADSL modems, even if you want to use your perfectly good one. Maybe they have a deal with the NSA, some custom spy software installed maybe?
So it’s no wonder that by pushing these modems, there would be a mass risk for vulnerabilities to be exploited.
There’s actually more than just the webproc.cgi flaw though, there’s several other massive flaws.
Around 60 percent of the modems have a hidden account, supposedly for “support purposes” with a laughably easy to guess, hard coded password. These 60% of devices all share the same password.
For a quarter of the routers, hackers are able to take a snapshot of the modems active memory. Of course this is a big issue, because this memory can contain credentials for past visited website, in plain text.
Worst yet, Lovett was able to track down the IP addresses of hackers exploiting these vulnerabilities, and most of the addresses were coming from China.
An expected fix for these vulnerabilities has yet to be rolled out, but for the time being you can check to see if your modem is effected by looking at the list.
Great news, you can now install and run FlexiSPY PREMIUM and EXTREME on Android devices running up to OS 5.0.1!
Our Android development team has been been hard at work since the minute 5.0 (also known as lollipop) was released, working non stop to try and crack the additional security coating that Android 5.0 placed on devices, and we’re here!
So, head on over to our Android page to check out all that FlexiSPY can do you for you.
Ambient recording is the ability to remotely switch on a mobile’s microphone, and start recording the sound picked up. The sound is sent to your web account where you can download and listen to it.
You can start these recordings two ways:
Immediately using the RECORD icon.
Automatically according to a predefined schedule using the SCHEDULE icon.
NOTE: All scheduled ambient recordings are limited to a maximum of 30 minutes
This article will show you how to use both of these features so that you can either set up ambient recording to record immediately or set it up according to a schedule and then listen to the recordings inside your web account on your PC.
How to set up a scheduled ambient recording
Click the Schedule option as shown in the Ambient section of your online account.
You will then need to click the Create A New Schedule Ambient Recording button.
You can then configure the scheduled ambient recording as follows:
Schedule Name – Type a name for your scheduled ambient recording
Start date – Set the start date and time for the scheduled ambient recording.
Recurrence – Make sure this option is checked.
Recurrence Pattern – Set the frequency of recurrence for the scheduled ambient recording.
Range of Recurrence – Set when you wish for the scheduled ambient recording to end.
Click Save to confirm the scheduled ambient recording and FlexiSPY will do the rest.
After that, you can view all scheduled ambient recordings you have currently set and edit them as you require or you can click Create A New Schedule Ambient Recording to create another one and repeat the process.
Once a scheduled ambient recording has been set the recording will be automatically uploaded to your web account once it is complete.
You can then click the Download button to download the ambient recording to your computer. Once it has been downloaded you can listen to it on your computer using software such as VLC Media Player.
How to set up ambient recording to record immediately
If you don’t want to schedule an ambient recording you can simply set up an ambient recording to record immediately according to the time duration that you set.
To set this up go to the Ambient tab of your web account and click the Record button.
You will then be asked to set the recording duration. This can be from 5 minutes up to 60 minutes. Once you have set the ambient recording duration click Start Ambient Recording Now.
The ambient recording will take place on the TARGET device according to the duration you specified and it will then be uploaded to your web account.
You can click Download to save it to your computer to listen to using software such as VLC Media Player.
Ambient recording and scheduled ambient recording gives you the flexibility to record the ambient audio from the TARGET device according to your own schedule.
This is incredibly powerful and allows you to set the ambient recording (be it to record immediately or scheduled) and forget about it and come back to your web account later on to download and listen to the recordings on your computer.
You can now install and run FlexiSPY PREMIUM and EXTREME on any jailbroken iOS device running iOS 8.1.2
This exciting announcement comes just days after the iOS 8.1.2 jailbreak was released!
How can I get FlexiSPY on my iOS 8.1.2 device?
The first thing you need to do is jailbreak the device, we have a guide for that, which explains all the steps, that you can read, here All it takes is a few minutes and the TARGET device in your hand to jailbreak the device with help from access to a PC and you will be up and jailbroken in no time. After being jailbroken, the installation of FlexiSPY will be as simple as ever, so why not start enjoying FlexiSPY on your jailbroken iOS 8.1.2 device today!
You can now install and run FlexiSPY PREMIUM as well as FlexiSPY iPad on any jailbroken iOS device running iOS 8.1! This means that you can now get the same unrivaled IM capturing capabilities on iOS 8.1 as well as great signature FlexiSPY features such as spy call and call interception.
How can I get FlexiSPY on my iOS 8.1 device?
The first thing you need to do is jailbreak the device, we have a guide for that, which explains all the steps, that you can read, here All it takes is a few minutes and the TARGET device in your hand to jailbreak the device with help from access to a PC and you will be up and jailbroken in no time. After being jailbroken, the installation of FlexiSPY will be as simple as ever, so why not start enjoying FlexiSPY on your jailbroken iOS 8.1 device today!
Sometimes you might want to change a capturing setting in the FlexiSPY control panel. Maybe you’d like to activate our Ambient Recording feature, or change what app’s you’re monitoring. Whatever the case, you’re given the option to choose the method that FlexiSPY will use to send the changes to the phone.
There are three ways to for sending commands to your Android device using FlexiSPY.
Network (FREE, works on all mobiles)
Push Notification (FREE, but not available on all mobiles)
SMS commands (requires purchase of SMS credits, works on all mobiles)
SMS credits are an optional way to send commands to FlexiSPY. They are used within Control Center in your online account to make sure time sensitive commands are processed immediately (e.g. Send Immediate – to send all data not yet uploaded immediately to your online account.)
The default is push notifications, or network. But these are sometimes slow, and can take an hour to arrive – which is perfectly fine for most users.
SMS commands arrive instantly, and are appropriate for professional use, where timing is important. You can always send SMS commands from your own mobile device, so you don’t ever need to buy SMS credits.
But for those users who value convenience, and the best possible performance, we give them the option to buy credits directly from inside the account portal inside your account tab.
Let’s take a look at how push notifications work;
Everything takes place inside the Control Center in your online account.
Just browse to the category for the command you wish to set and set the options you want to change.
Click Sync Now when done and wait for the push notification to be sent to the Android TARGET device.
With the push notification sent to the device the changes will then be applied.
FlexiSPY has long had a reputation for being the best, but ridiculously expensive. That’s only half true however, because we have never been expensive.
Our PREMIUM product is available at $149 for a year, which compares well against mSpy $199 for the same time period.
Of course our competitors and the fake review sites out there went even further and ignored PREMIUM, choosing to only mention the price of EXTREME – a product with features that they did not even have.
We decided it was time to do something about this.
From today, FlexiSPY PREMIUM can be purchased, starting from $68. We have also reduced the entry point for the EXTREME product to $199. This makes us the cheapest, 100% invisible, mobile monitoring product available.
Don’t just take our word for it though, below we’ve compared FlexiSPY to our competitors in three key areas: price, features, and software visibility.
Note: Mobile-Spy is not included in our comparison charts as their app can no longer be considered a true “spy application” as their app can no longer be hidden.
Pricing – new monthly payment options
We have a brand new pricing structure, offering our Premium and EXTREME packages in cheaper monthly options.
Subscription Periods
FlexiSPY Premium
mSpy Premium
FlexiSPY EXTREME
1 month
$69.99
Not offered
3 month
$119.99
$199
6 months
Not offered
$149.99
Not offered
12 months
$199.99
$349
As the chart shows, we are now cheaper than mSpy in both 3 month and 12 month subscriptions.
Features – who gives you more?
This is also a big thing to consider: We are now the only smartphone monitoring software that offers both call recording and ambient recording. These two features are not offered by either mSpy or Mobile Spy.
Feature
FlexiSPY Extreme
Mspy Premium
Ambient Recording
✓
❌
Call Recording
✓
❌
Number of IM services captured
13 for both EXTREME and Premium versions
6
We also have support for capturing 13 instant messengers. This is over twice the amount of mSpy.
We have performed extensive tests to prove that FlexiSPY gives you the best instant messaging capturing experience when compared against its competitors and you can read about this in full by clicking here.
Software Visibility – hidden or not hidden?
Lastly, in the wake of what happened to StealthGenie, We’d like to say that FlexiSPY has always offered its customers the ability to hide the visible software icon after installation based upon whether or not it is legal for them to do so.
Feature
FlexiSPY Extreme
FlexiSPY Premium
Mspy Premium
Visible icon after installation
✓
✓
❌
Ability to hide software icon based upon legal situation
✓
✓
❌
FlexiSPY has always been about respecting the law. That is why FlexiSPY is still the only smartphone monitoring software that can allow you to hide its icon should your countries laws permit this. You can read more about how other smartphone monitoring software are surreptitious compared to FlexiSPY by clicking here.
Article In Brief –
Overall FlexiSPY beats its competitors in four key areas:
Price per month
IM capturing
Call and ambient recording
Software Visibility
We think that the facts speak for themselves, and we hope this has provided some valuable information! If you’d like to voice your opinion on the matter, please share it via the comments section below!
Since the StealthGenie incident, smartphone monitoring software based in the USA have been busy making changes to make sure that they stay legal in the eyes of the law. This is why mSpy, who were the only other smartphone monitoring software to offer the ability to record phone calls, and ambient recording, have now removed both of these two features from their products.
That’s right.
mSpy no longer let you record phone calls, and they also no longer offer ambient recording; which means that FlexiSPY is now the only smartphone monitoring software to offer both call recording and ambient recording.
Recording phone calls gives you a complete 1:1 recording of all calls that are placed to and from the TARGET device. Because we understand that you cannot always be around to listen in to a call live, our call recording option allows you to simply set up the options and forget them and come back at the end of the day to listen to all the captured recordings.
Ambient recording is the same. With this feature you can record spycalls that take place on the TARGET device as well as listen to the surroundings in general. Again, with a quick and easy to use interface you can set up ambient recording in minutes and be up and recording in no time.
Let’s take a quick look to see how these features work.
Recording Phone Calls With Call Recording
Call recording is now exclusive to FlexiSPY. To begin, make sure you have enabled the call recording option inside your online account, through the Control Center, and also have set the watchlist to record the different kinds of calls you want to record (e.g. numbers in address book, not in address book, numbers you specify yourself etc.).
After that every time a call is placed to or from the TARGET device it will be recorded and uploaded to your online account.
You then simply download the recording from your online account to your PC and listen to it offline using popular PC programs such as VLC Media Player, Windows Media Player, etc..
Call recording is currently available as part of FlexiSPY EXTREME and is compatible with rooted and non-rooted Android devices only.
Ambient Recording
This is another feature that only we offer.
Ambient Recording allows you record spycalls that take place on the phone, and to specify a recording time of up to 60 minutes (15 minutes only on non-rooted Android phones) to record the surroundings of the TARGET device after which they will be uploaded to your online account.
As with call recordings you simply download the recording file from your online account to your PC so that you can listen to it offline using software such as VLC Media Player.
Ambient recording is currently available in FlexiSPY Extreme for rooted and non-rooted Android devices, iPhone (jailbroken) & Symbian.
We’ve tried to make recording phone calls and ambient recording both quick and easy. and we hope this guide has provided valuable information.
So we’d also like to extend this offer;
If you have purchased a competitors product, counting on their call recording features to work, and are now dissatisfied because they no longer support these features, then we’d like to invite you into our trade-in program.
Our trade-in program let’s you “trade-in” the value of your current competitors software towards a FlexiSPY license.
We’ve completed countless amounts of trade-in offers so far and we’d love to have you on board with FlexiSPY!
Disclaimer: While installing ADB is a safe process, please follow all the steps carefully. FlexiSPY is not responsible for any damage or data loss through following this article and all steps are correct at the time of writing. Create a Windows system restore point at any time if you are unsure. Performing these steps is your own responsibility.
If you are a casual Android user who just uses their phone for Facebook, Clash of Clans, calls and emails then you most likely won’t be interested in ADB or what it is. But for those who like to tinker with the plethora of Android customization options available to the platform ADB is an integral part of the experience.
But what is ADB and why should Android owners become familiar with it?
When you plug in your Android phone or table to your PC Windows will happily display the contents of the phone for you to work with. This can be internal storage or external storage from an Sdcard you have inserted. But surely you must have wondered, what else is on my phone and how can I get access to it?
ADB is the answer
ADB stands for ‘Android Device Bridge’ and is a set of tools for your PC that allows you to interface with your Android phone at the very lowest level in terms of system and processes. You essentially can access all areas of your Android phone and its filesystem instead of the areas deemed safe by the manufacturers that only Windows can see.
ADB allows you to perform advanced operations on your Android phone that you would otherwise normally not be able to.
But what are these ‘advanced operations’ you mention?
Usually ADB is commonly used for rooting. An Android phone software is powered by the Android OS which is based on Linux. On Linux there are certain levels of user responsibility, the highest being superuser which allows you to change anything.
Your Android phone is the same. By default the filesystem of the phone is locked down by the phone manufacturer but you can gain full and complete access to the device by gaining root (hence the term ‘rooting’). This lets you do anything you want on the phone and ADB helps make this happen.
So if you want to root an Android phone or perhaps install a custom ROM or basically just perform advanced tasks on your Android phone then you’ll need ADB so let’s install it.
What is needed to install ADB?
To install ADB you will need a PC. You will need to download and install the Android SDK which you can get from here.
Once you have downloaded the Android SDK save it to an easy to remember folder, for this article we are going to use C:\Android on the PC we are using to write this article.
Here we have downloaded the Android SDK to the desktop.
We will now extract the contents of the folder.
The above screenshots show what is inside the extracted SDK. We will now make a new directory on our C drive called Android and we will copy the three folders shown above.
If you are wondering, you simply navigate to SDK > platform-tools and ADB will be shown along with Fastboot which is also needed if you are rooting
Note: You will not see a platform-tools folder after you extract the SDK. You must install it first which we discuss now.
How do you configure ADB?
To configure ADB and make sure you have the right packages installed launch SDK Manager.
Because you are running it for the first time it will ask you which packages you wish to install, we must install Platform-tools because this is what contains ADB.
Just make sure Android SDK Platform-tools is checked, click Accept and then click Install.
Installing all the packages may take some time – please be patient.
When all packages are install the SDK Manager should look like this.
As you can see, Android SDK Tools and Android SDK Platform Tools are both installed.
Set the Windows ADB path variable
Based on which version of Windows you have (we are using Windows 8.1) the steps here may be a little different. Basically we need to tell Windows that the SDK actually lists and has its own unique path. That way, when ADB is invoked by a program (e.g. a rooting tool) it knows where to find the required file inside your SDK installation folder.
Because you are modifying system variables and paths you may want to create a Windows system restore point first.
You need to access Advanced System Settings.
To do this (on Windows 8.1), press the Windows key + S to bring up the search box and type Advanced System Settings and click the entry that appears.
On the menu that appears click Environment Variables.
The environmental variables window will appear and this is what we need to edit.
Under System Variables, scroll down to Path and click Edit.
Note: Do not delete the variable value field in any way.
Instead, append it. At the end, add the following line (include the ; at the start):
Note: Remember that we installed our Android SDK to C:\Android? Your SDK folder location may be different so please make sure you update the variable value field with the correct path.
Click OK when done.
Now that you have done that you need to install the Android USB drivers.
Installing USB drivers using the SDK Manager
For many Android phones, once you have connected them to your PC, they require their own special set of drivers for Windows to be able to recognize them and allow you to interface with it using ADB.
To do this, inside SDK Manager, scroll down to Extras.
Make sure Google USB Driver is selected and then install it.
The Google USB driver should work for most Android devices once they are plugged in to your PC but not all phone manufacturers require the use of ADB however you should always make sure that you have installed the latest USB drivers for the Android device you wish to root on to your PC.
Now that you have done that there is one more final thing to do.
Test that ADB works correctly
Now that we have set up ADB and installed the Android USB drivers it is time to test it all work.
Plug in any Android phone to your PC using its USB cable.
On the Android phone enable USB debugging. To do this go to Settings > About Phone (or About Device) and tap build number until the Developer Options menu is enabled.
Once inside the Developer Options menu make sure USB Debugging is checked.
On your PC open up a Windows command prompt by opening Run (Windows key + R) and then entering cmd and then press Enter.
In the command prompt window type adb devices and press Enter.
If everything is working properly the command window will display the device data as shown below.
Congratulations! You have now successfully setup and configured ADB for your Android phone and you can perform many additional tasks such as rooting, OS upgrading, OS downgrading and other custom options.
Here on the FlexiSPY blog we love to customise our devices and root them and jailbreak them but we understand that this does not come without risk. Therefore, in this article we will explain how you can quickly and safely backup the entire contents of your Android phone.
The benefits of doing this are numerous such as if you decided to downgrade the OS or install a custom ROM for example – backing up the Android phone can often be a lifesaver.
Disclaimer: FlexiSPY is not responsible for any loss of data or damages incurred from following the directions given. The directions were accurate at the time of writing. Please make sure you follow the rooting guide correctly if you need to root your phone first and make sure your phone has enough storage space to perform a backup before proceeding.
What is needed to backup the Android phone?
To backup the Android phone you will need the Android phone in your hand and, depending on the method of backup (discussed later) a PC may also be required.
What is the easiest way to backup an Android phone?
The easiest way is on the device itself and even though you think that means you do not need a PC it actually does. This is because you need to have rooted the Android phone first to install a custom recovery on it and it is through booting in to this custom recovery that you can then perform a full backup of the phone.
Usually this is to the SD card that you have inserted but what if you do not have an SD card? You can save the backup to the internal memory of the Android phone but if the phone is restored or reset you risk losing the backup so you still need a PC to transfer the backup file (which can often be large such as several gigabytes) to a PC for safekeeping.
To backup the Android phone itself, as mentioned, you will still need a PC to transfer the backup file from the Android phone to the PC for safekeeping once the backup is complete. However you also need to make sure that the Android phone you want to backup, on the device itself has been rooted as well.
Why is this?
Because rooting a phone is what installs a custom recovery. It is the custom recovery that has the feature that allows for the Android phone to be backed up directly to the device to start with.
You can find out more on what rooting is and why it can be a good thing by reading this article.
Essentially backing up the phone directly to the device consists of three steps.
Root the phone (this installs the custom recovery mode)
Backup the phone using the device itself and custom recovery
Transfer the backup file to a PC for safekeeping
For the sake of this article we are going to assume that you have already rooted your Android device. If you haven’t and you want to know how to root some of the more popular Android handsets then be sure to check out rooting help here.
So how do you backup the phone to the device itself?
First of all you must boot the phone in to recovery mode.
To do this you do the following:
Turn the phone off completely.
Hold down the Volume Up, Home and Power buttons together.
Wait until the phone boots up.
Providing you have done this correctly the phone will boot up and it will look like below. If your phone does not boot in to custom recovery mode then it most likely has not been rooted so please remember to root it first otherwise this article cannot be followed.
Use the volume up and volume down keys to select and the power button to confirm.
From the main menu choose backup and restore.
On the menu that appears choose the backup option.
The backup process will start – please be patient, this may take some time.
Once it is complete you need to transfer the backup file to a PC for safekeeping.
This is done by doing the following:
1. Reboot the phone after using the recovery mode to backup the phone. – The Android phone will be recognised by Windows.
Double click Phone. The contents of the phone internal memory will be displayed.
Double-click the clockworkmod folder.
Inside the clockwork mod folder you’ll find that there are no backup files of any kind.
So where are they?
This is why you need root access.
The clockworkmod backups are actually located on the Android phone in /mnt/shell/emulated/clockworkmod/backup.
We will show you how to find the backup files using ES File Explorer which is freely available on the Play Store.
Simply search for ES File Explorer on the Play Store and install it.
Once it’s installed, run the program
You now need to get root permissions from the application to find the hidden location where the backups are stored. This option is found in the Tools menu.
In the Tools menu set Root Explorer to ON and grant root permission when asked.
Once root permission has been granted browse to the original file location – /mnt/shell/emulated/clockworkmod/backup
This time the folder will not be empty and the backups will be listed.
If you open up any backup folder you can verify the contents.
But now that we have found the backups how do we get that folder on to our PC for safekeeping?
By copying the backup folder to a folder on the Android phone that the PC can access such as the Downloads folder.
To copy the folder press and tap the folder icon and then tap Copy that appears at the bottom of the screen.
You then need to browse to the main downloads folder.
When you have reached the Download folder tap the Paste button to start copying.
Wait for the copying process to be completed – this may take some time.
Now that you have copied the backup file to a folder that your PC can access on the Android phone we can now copy it to our PC for safekeeping.
To do this make sure that you have plugged your Android phone in to your computer. Once it is plugged in simply browse the phone until you reach the Download folder.
Inside there will be the backup file we copied previously
As you can see, backup folders are there. Simply copy these folders to a convenient place on your PC for safekeeping and everything is complete.
You have now successfully backed up your phone entirely. We will discuss how to restore these backups in a separate article.
Android phones give you the most functionality and customisation options when compared to all other rivals on the market. But what happens when it goes wrong? What if you install the wrong custom ROM or you have just downgraded the OS and want to restore from backup – what do you do?
Firstly you must always make sure you have backed up your Android phone first before you attempt to change anything significantly on your Android phone, we show you how to do that here.
Disclaimer: FlexiSPY is not responsible for any loss of data or damages incurred from following the directions given. Please make sure you have correctly performed all the device requirements for backing up the phone and have correctly backed up the phone before proceeding as well as correctly restoring the appropriate backup for the correct Android phone being used – restoring the phone is done entirely at your own risk.
What is needed to restore the Android phone?
Restoring the Android phone requires that you have done the following:
Rooted the Android phone
Backed up the Android phone to the device itself
For the sake of writing this argument we are going to already assume you have rooted the Android phone and made a backup of the phone to the device itself.
How to restore an Android backup using custom recovery
Restoring from backup is really simple.
All you need to do is put the phone in to recovery mode.
To do this you do the following:
Turn the phone off completely.
Hold down the Volume Up, Home and Power buttons together.
Wait until the phone boots up.
When it boots in to recovery mode it will look like this.
Using the Volume up and Volume down buttons to choose and the Power button to select choose the backup and restore option.
On the screen that appears choose the restore option.
Providing you have backed up the phone to the device already your backups should be listed.
Select the backup file that you want to restore.
On the screen that appears scroll down to Yes – Restore and select it to start the restoration process.
The restoration process CANNOT be undone so please make sure that you are restoring both the correct backup file and that you really do need to restore the phone from backup.
Once the backup is complete exit all menus until you appear again on the main recovery menu and reboot the phone.
Once the phone has rebooted everything should be from the backup you made meaning that your phone should now be fully functioning again if you had to restore from backup because of an issue.
Installing custom ROMS, downgrading, upgrading, rooting, tweaks, installing kernels – the modifications and tweaks you can do for an Android phone far outnumber that from any other platform or rival. However sometimes these procedures can be technical and, sometimes also, things may not turn out for the best – so how can you get your Android phone up and running again?
Firstly you must always make sure you have backed up your Android phone first before you attempt to change anything significantly on your Android phone, we show you how to do that using your PC here.
Disclaimer: FlexiSPY is not responsible for any loss of data or damages incurred from following the directions given. Please make sure you have correctly performed all the device requirements for backing up the phone and have correctly backed up the phone before proceeding as well as correctly restoring the appropriate backup for the correct Android phone being used – restoring the phone is done entirely at your own risk.
What is needed to restore the Android phone?
Restoring the Android phone requires that you have done the following:
Rooted the Android phone
Backed up the Android phone to your PC using EFS Professional
For the sake of this article we are going to assume that you have already rooted the Android phone, backed it up to your PC and stored that backup file in a safe place so now it is time to restore it.
For restoring the phone, as we discussed in our article on how to backup the phone to your PC, we are going to use the same software – EFS Professional.
We are also going to assume that you have already downloaded EFS Professional and you have already made a backup that we can restore from (we discussed this already and how to do it – see the link at the beginning of the article).
How to restore from backup using EFS Professional
First of all, as stated, make sure you have already made a backup of your Android phone using EFS Professional – we will assume you have.
Firstly, connect your Android phone to your PC.
Once connected run EFS Professional.
Click the Restore tab.
Click the drop-down menu to show a list of backups already saved. For those who are wondering the backup files are stored inside a folder called EFSProBackup inside the main folder you are running EFS Professional from.
From the drop-down menu choose the backup that you wish to restore.
NOTE: ALWAYS MAKE SURE YOU ARE RESTORING A BACKUP THAT MATCHES THE PHONE MODEL YOU ARE RESTORING TO. FOR EXAMPLE, IF YOU BACKUP A SAMSUNG GALAXY SIII AND TRY TO RESTORE A BACKUP FROM A SAMUNG GALAXY S4 IT MAY CAUSE ISSUES – ALWAYS CHECK THE MODEL NUMBERS MATCH ON THE BACKUP AND PHONE BEING RESTORED.
Once you have picked the correct backup simply click the Restore button to start the restore process – please be patient, this may take some time.
Once the process has completed simply disconnect the phone from the PC and it should be restored to its previous state.
Disclaimer: FlexiSPY is not responsible for any loss of data or damages incurred from following the directions given. The directions were accurate at the time of writing. Please make sure you follow the rooting guide correctly if you need to root your phone first and make sure your phone has enough storage space to perform a backup before proceeding.
What is needed to backup the Android phone?
To backup the Android phone you will need the Android phone itself and a PC
Why backup the phone?
Accidents can happen. You may install something that corrupts or crashes the phone or you may want to root the phone or install a custom ROM on it. Either way a lot of activities you can do on Android have the possibility of wiping the device completely first before the action is carried out so it makes sense to always prepare a backup.
What is the easiest way to backup the phone using your PC?
We have already outlined the backup process in several articles on the FlexiSPY blog. Basically you should always make a phone backup before you install anything that may harm the filesystem of the phone and cause it to stop functioning or before you perform a task that will perform a factory reset on the Android phone itself.
Our software of choice to backup the phone to a PC is EFS Professional but there are some requirements first that must be done before EFS Professional works.
Download EFS Professional
Root the Android phone you wish to backup
Install BusyBox on to the rooted Android phone
Turn on USB debugging on the rooted Android phone with BusyBox installed
Connect the Android phone to the PC
Run EFS Professional and perform the backup
To get started you can download the latest version of EFS Professional.
Now that you have downloaded EFS Professional, if you have not already rooted the Android phone you want to backup many popular Android handsets have rooting guides here.
So, with the Android phone rooted and EFS Professional on your PC it is time to get ready to perform the backup. The final step is to, on the Android phone, download and install BusyBox.
Now you connect the Android phone to the PC and run EFS Professional. The first thing it does is check that the phone is rooted and BusyBox has been installed and establishes a USB connection so make sure to confirm on the Android phone screen when a USB debugging dialog box appears asking for access.
We then click the Backup tab to get started.
Under the Device Filter option click the drop-down menu and choose *** All Partitions ***
Then simply click the Backup option to start the backup process.
Please be patient as this process may take some time.
Once the process has completed, on your PC, open up the connected Android phone.
There will be a new folder called EFSProBackup with the backup inside. Simply copy the entire folder to your PC for safekeeping.
Backing up your Android phone really is a simple process.
We also show how you can backup an Android phone on the device itself instead using a custom recovery and that can be found here. No matter which method of backup you choose for your Android phone the FlexiSPY blog has you covered.
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