When many of us think smartphone security, the first company that pops into mind is BlackBerry. It’s the reason many enterprise users have trusted the brand all these years. However, for the average BlackBerry user, it seems like the only real security you can get is from passcode-protecting your device. BlackBerry Protect, however, should give you a little more peace of mind when it comes to securing your handset.
BlackBerry Protect is in beta and open to all users. Here is what you can do with the new security feature:
- Assisting in locating your BlackBerry smartphone on a map via GPS and cell-tower triangulation
- Locking and setting a device password
- Activating a special loud ring to help find your smartphone, even if it’s in silent mode
- Displaying a custom message on the home screen so that anyone who finds it knows how to return it
- Forcing an instant wireless backup of data even when you don’t have the smartphone with you
- And as a last resort, securely wiping all information from your BlackBerry smartphone, including the data from your SD card.
- Automatically, periodically and wirelessly backing up your contacts, calendar appointments, memos, tasks, browser bookmarks, and text messages
- Optionally restricting backup to when within Wi-Fi® coverage or disable backup when roaming
- Wirelessly restoring backed up data to a new BlackBerry smartphone
It seems that these features are beginning to come standard in a lot of smartphones these days. Being able to remotely locate, lock and wipe your device is a huge perk if your BlackBerry is ever lost or stolen, and being able to wipe data from your SD card is actually pretty cool.
You can install BlackBerry Protect Beta for free right now and start taking advantage of its new security features. There is definitely no reason to opt out of using the service when we practically live on our smartphones these days.
[Via: BlackBerry]