Keep your convos secret from prying eyes.
You need to make sure that messages and notifications from your iPhone or iPad are not visible to anyone else. To paraphrase Dr Manhattan, we are not condoning or condemning your reasons. We just want to help you walk through the steps.
You can hide messages notifications so they don’t appear on your lock screen or conceal your actual message chain into a folder that someone won’t see. Or switch to a different messaging app with password protection and timed deletion of text messages.
We will walk you through each option until you find the one that suits your needs best.
iPhones can hide message notifications
Scroll down to the messaging app you prefer by opening Settings > Notifications. To find privacy options, open each notification setting.
- Allow notifications: Untick this and you won’t see any alerts from the app. You’ll need to look within the app to see if a message has been sent.
- Alerts: You can leave notifications, but you must deselect the Lock Screen to see the alert message.
- Show Previews: If you leave the lock screen notifications on, it will make sure that you only have access to them after you unlock your phone with Face ID.
- Sounds: This menu will disable the default vibration and alert tone for the app. Your phone will not give your number away when you get a text message from it.
- It may be that you only wish to hide one conversation’s alert notifications. This will differ from one app to another, but it is relatively easy in Apple Messages. Tap the profile icon at the top of the conversation. Click Info to toggle Hide Alerts.
How to hide a conversation in Apple Messages
Hide alerts from a contact work to a certain extent. However, the text conversation will remain fully visible in-app if another person unlocked your phone, especially if it was recently texted.
To hide a conversation, delete it. To make the trash icon appear, tap and hold a message or swipe right-to-left. To confirm that you want it to be erased, tap the red trash icon.
You can save your messages to your iPhone or iPad backup before you delete them. The Decipher app is available for Windows and Mac. It will read your iPhone/ iPad backup and export your conversation as a PDF or plain text version.
If you don’t wish to delete the conversation but want to text this person, it is best to delete their contact in your address book. Next, go to Settings > Messages. Scroll down to Message Filtering. You can then toggle Filter Unknown Subscribers.
This option is recommended for people who want to block text messages from iPhones. It filters spam into a separate folder and blocks notifications from them. It’s similar to an email spam folder.
Filter Unknown Senders also serves privacy purposes. Because you have removed this person from your contacts and their messages won’t trigger alarms, they will only be visible to someone in a folder that no one would typically consider.
Find a private iOS messaging app
Apple Messages was created for convenience and accessibility, not privacy. Instead, you should not resort to disabling and workarounds, but switch to an app that values privacy.
Signal and Telegram both offer encryption at the end of each line to ensure that your messages are secure. They also allow you to password-protect the app so that anyone with access to your phone password can’t view your private messages.
One other privacy feature that many messaging apps offer is the ability to activate Auto Deletion for specific conversations. Telegram lets you set a timer for 24 hours or 7 days, and then any messages older than that will be deleted by default.
Signal and Telegram both allow you to send messages that automatically delete on the receiver’s side, in case privacy is a concern. Telegram allows you to delete all messages you have sent to someone else on your phone as well as theirs.
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