Your smartphone may have photos that you don’t want to show everyone. Fortunately, on Android as on iPhone, it is possible to hide images that must remain confidential.
There is no doubt that your smartphone is full of photos that you have taken over time. And when you want to show some of them to loved ones, the classic reflex is to hand them the phone so that they can look at them comfortably by scrolling through them on the screen in the image gallery. Alas, one swipe too many can be enough to reveal photos that you would have preferred to keep private. Embarrassing or even compromising…
Fortunately, there are solutions to preserve your privacy and only make the images you want available for viewing. Those with more sensitive or more intimate content can thus be hidden from the view of anyone and remain private. The good news is that it is not necessary to download a specific app to hide images: both iPhones and Android models offer this possibility as standard, with the apps installed by default.
Apple’s Photos app, which stores all the photos taken with an iPhone, has a special option to hide photos.
► Open the Photos app, then locate the photo you want to hide in the gallery. Long press on it. From the menu that appears, choose Hide.
► Confirm your choice in the menu that appears by pressing Hide photo. She immediately disappears from the gallery.
► If you want to hide several photos at once, select them from the gallery then press the three points of suspension at the bottom right of the screen. Press on Hide in the menu that appears then confirm your choice.
► To find images you’ve hidden, open your photo gallery in the Photos app. Press on Albums at the bottom of the screen. Scroll down the menu contents and tap Masked.
► You will need to identify yourself using Face ID or Touch ID to access your sensitive images.
It is very likely that you have activated the synchronization of your Android device with Google Photos in order to automatically save your images in Google’s online storage space. In this case, you can already create a locked folder which will accommodate your sensitive images, both on your device and online. Follow our practical guide to do this.
But maybe you don’t use Google Photos and prefer to keep your images in the device’s photo gallery as is offered by several manufacturers. In this case too you have the right to your dose of confidentiality. Here is the procedure to follow for the main brands which, with their software overlay applied to Android, offer an app to manage your photos. The following methods concern the most common brands.
Hide photos on a Samsung smartphone
► Open the Samsung Gallery app. Display the image you want to hide on the screen then press the three points superimposed top right. From the menu that appears, choose Move to Secure Folder.
► Confirm your choice by pressing Move at the bottom of the screen.
► If you have not previously created a secure folder, tap Continue. The device will then generate a locked folder in the smartphone’s storage space, accessible only with your fingerprint, a password or a PIN code.
► To find your images, search for the app Secure folder on your smartphone and launch it. Identify yourself using the saved password or PIN code to access the secure version of the Gallery app and find your photos there.
► Please note, Samsung now offers to synchronize its gallery with Microsoft’s OneDrive online space. If synchronization is enabled, your photos, even if moved to the secure folder, will continue to appear in Samsung’s gallery.
Hide photos on a Xiaomi or Poco smartphone
To hide images in the Gallery application from MIUI, Xiaomi’s software overlay, it is first necessary to create an album. He is the one who will be hidden in plain sight. Attention. Its access is not locked. Anyone who knows how to reveal its existence will be able to access its content.
► Start by opening the Gallery app. Press on Album at the top of the screen then on the button + at the bottom right to create a new album. Give it a name and validate.
► Now select the images from the gallery that you wish to integrate into this album and validate with a press on the check mark at the top right of the screen. In the menu that appears, choose the option Move.
► Now make a long press on the album to hide then choose Hide at the bottom of the screen.
► To view this now hidden album, from the gallery, tap the three points superimposed at the top right of the screen. From the menu that appears, choose Settings. In the window that appears, tap View hidden albums.
► All that remains is to press the button Unmask from the hidden album. It then becomes visible among the other albums.
Hide photos on an Honor smartphone
► In the Honor Gallery app, view the image you want to hide. Press on More at the bottom right of the screen. In the menu that appears, choose the option Hide.
► Then confirm your choice by pressing OK. It’s done, the image is hidden.
► To find your sensitive photos, open the gallery then press the three points superimposed at the top right of the screen. From the menu that appears, choose Hidden elements. You will need to authenticate yourself (PIN code, fingerprint, or face) to access these elements.
If the brand of your mobile is not one of those described above, check if its system does not simply rely on the Google Photos app, supplied as standard on Android. If your device has its own image gallery, dig into the options available in the settings as soon as a snapshot is displayed on the screen. A Hide or Hide menu is probably nestled there.