Privacy

LastUnlock displays the last time your iPhone was unlocked on the Lock screen

If you have a jailbroken handset in your possession and you’re paranoid that someone might know your passcode and that they might be logging into your device when you aren’t looking, then you just might come to appreciate a newly-released and free jailbreak tweak dubbed LastUnlock by iOS developer Smokin1337.

As indicated by the screenshot example above, LastUnlock records the most recent date and time that your handset was unlocked (whether it was by you or someone else) and displays it on the Lock screen where the ‘press Home to unlock’ or ‘swipe up to unlock’ text would typically appear.

SiriUnlock lets you access more data with Siri without unlocking your handset

Siri can make interacting with your iOS handset easier, and more specifically, the ‘Hey Siri’ feature comes in handy when you have dirty hands and you don’t want to touch your device. But when your handset is locked, Apple prevents Siri from accessing certain things to protect your privacy from those who may try to exploit her handiness to reveal personal information about you.

While we can understand Apple’s reasoning for doing this, we also understand that some iOS device power users care more about functionality than privacy, and so it would’ve been nice if Apple offered more flexibility in this department. Fortunately, a newly released and free jailbreak tweak called SiriUnlock by iOS developer CokePokes makes this happen.

This tweak necessitates Face ID authentication to access the Photos app’s Hidden album

You can hide sensitive images from your Photos app’s Camera Roll by moving them to the app’s Hidden album, but it doesn’t take much for someone with access to your handset to find the Hidden album and start perusing through the images it contains.

With this caveat in mind, iOS developer Menuska has released a new free jailbreak tweak called FaceID for Hidden Photos that adds a biometric authentication requirement to the Photos app’s Hidden album. With it, you’ll need to pass a Face ID authentication test to access the Hidden album’s contents, as shown in the screenshot example below:

iOS 13 doubles down on location privacy; ‘Sign In with Apple’ secures logging into sites and apps

iOS 13 brings plenty of new features to the mobile operating system, which Apple officially announced at this year's WWDC keynote. The software will launch later this year, and Apple is bringing with it even more privacy and security aspects to the mobile OS. That includes doubling down on privacy security and a new way to log into apps and websites.