In a dangerous situation, it is sometimes useful to completely lock your smartphone. With Android Pie, you have ‘lockdown’ for that. This is how you set it up.
This is how the Android Pie lockdown mode works
On more and more new smartphones you only need your face to unlock. That’s usually nice and handy: you just have to look at your device to pass the lock screen. Unfortunately, it is not nearly as safe. Sometimes the security can already be bypassed with a photo, and otherwise, someone just has to hold the device in front of you to get access to all data.
In some situations that can cause serious problems. If your smartphone is stolen, you want to make it harder for the thief. And if the police want access to your device because sensitive data is stored, then in some cases you prefer not to cooperate. In many countries, the police cannot force you to enter a PIN code, but face recognition can easily be bypassed during an interrogation.
Android Pie introduces lockdown mode for such situations. This allows you to completely lock your device at any time with a special button combination. As soon as lockdown (or ‘Closed’) is activated, your device can only be unlocked with your pin code or password. Your fingerprint scanner and face recognition will only work again once you have entered the code once.
Set Android Pie lockdown
Before you can use lockdown, you must first activate the option. To do this, follow the steps below.
- Open the Settings;
- Go to ‘Security and location’;
- Select ‘Lock screen preferences’
- Press ‘Show lockdown options’ to activate lockdown.
Once you’ve set everything up, you can lock your device at lightning speed. Press the power button of your device for two seconds, and select ‘lockdown’. You can then only unlock with your pin code.
Note: the function is unfortunately not (yet) available on all smartphones with Android Pie. Some manufacturers make adjustments to Android and choose not to add certain new functions. For example, lockdown is available on the OnePlus 6T, Sony Xperia XZ3 and Google Pixel 3, but not on the Huawei Mate 20 Pro.