How To Clear Iphone Before Giving Away

iphone_sexting

Giving away, returning, or just lending your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad and need to know how to clear off any porn -- er, adult content -- that might have somehow made its way onto your device? We may not have had the fun with this issue that our Android Central friends did over the holidays, but we can share their cautionary advice... after the break!

Steve Jobs might say Android is for porn and iPhone is not (never mind the numbers...), but iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad have Safari, the best web browser in the mobile business, and as everyone but Apple's CEO apparently knows -- the web, it has porn. More than that, your texts might be sexts, your email extreme, your photos more than flirty, and while your App Store apps can't be rated XXX, they still could be rated R. How do you tidy things up before giving away or lending your device? Here are some options

Total Wipe

If you're just returning your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad to Apple, Best Buy, or another retailer your best option is to nuke it completely, i.e. "Erase all content and settings."

How to erase all personal data from your iPhone

The instructions are pretty much the same for iPod touch and iPad, and you'll be left with a device almost in factory fresh condition.

Selective Wipe

If you just want to lend your device, or want to sell it while maintaining a Jailbreak on older firmware, you'll need to be more selective.

Deleting Text/SMS/MMS Messages

Launch the Messages app
Tap Edit
Tap the red - icon on the left
Tap the red Delete button to confirm
Repeat for any and all conversations you want to delete

delete messages

Or you can simply choose to delete only certain specific SMS or MMS messages.

Deleting Photos

You can only delete Photos that are in the Camera Roll. If you want to delete a synced album you have to connect to iTunes and deselect the photos so they don't sync any more. To delete from the Camera Roll:

Launch Photos
Follow the directions for selecting multiple Photos (There's no limit to the amount of photos you can select for deletion.)
Choose Delete instead of Share... carefully!

delete photos

Clearing Mail

Just remove the email account. You can always add it back later, especially if it's a server-side IMAP or ActiveSync account like MobileMe, Gmail, Exchange, etc.

Launch Settings
Scroll down to Mail, Contacts, Calendars
Tap Mail, Contacts, Calendars
Tap the account you want to delete
Scroll to the bottom
Tap Delete

delete email account

If you really only want to delete individual email threads:

Launch Mail
Follow the same instructions as for Messages, as described above.

Clearing Safari

Streaming might be safer than storing on-device, but web sites, especially advertising heavy web sites, especially porn sites, love to keep track of you. While there's no "private browsing mode" for iOS Safari like there is for Mac Safari, you can still manually clear it out.

Launch Settings
Follow the directions in our tip on how to clear out Safari

Deleting Apps

Deleting apps, or Home Screen clipped web site, is easy:

Touch and hold your finger down on the app until it goes into "Jiggly Mode" (starts to dance around).
Look for the small X badge at the top left of the app you want to delete
Tap the small X badge
A dialog box will pop up identifying the name of the app you're about to delete and warning you that you'll delete all the data in the app as well (your account login, game progress, etc.)
If you're sure, tap Delete (if you're not, tap Cancel)
If you decide not to delete an app, tap the Home Button to exit Jiggly Mode

How to delete an iPhone or iPad app

Deleting Movies

If you have synced any movies over, they're simple to delete as well:

Launch iPod
Tap Movies
Swipe from left to right over the movie
Tap the Delete button

delete movies

Deny, deny, deny

Again, the "Erase all content and settings" is your first, best option if you're really getting rid of your device. With everything else, your being human, you'll eventually mess up. If you do, just remember what every celebrity and politician on every talk/news show in America has taught us -- deny, deny, deny!

(Or if you have any better ideas, leave them in comments!)