What is mobile phone cloning?

Mobile phone cloning, a term which is widely used these days is coming to light which raises concerns about the privacy of a person, and if their phone can be cloned easily to access the data.

Let’s get the basics right first. Smartphone cloning isn’t that easy and requires a certain programming skillset to do so. If you don’t know what smartphone cloning is, we will explain it to you in simple words.

Phone cloning

Phone cloning refers to the process of copying a phone’s complete cellular identity including the International Mobile Station Equipment Identity (IMEI) number that is unique for every mobile phone and its data and using it in another device. Phone cloning is not legal for individuals. That is why it is considered a crime if it is done unwillingly.

In a recent example for phone cloning, many believe that in the recent Drug probe related to Sushant Singh Rajput’s death, authorities got the WhatsApp chats as some sort of proof that lead to the summoning of Deepika Padukone, was done through Phone Cloning.

You might ask that if the process is illegal, how and why was it used. The answer to the question is pretty simple as the chats were used for investigation purposes, the authorities use Forensics to dig through the chats and clone them.

In earlier times, physical access was required to clone a phone as the process required cables and wasn’t possible wirelessly. But in today’s world, where smartphones are becoming the most advanced tech we use daily, the process can easily be initiated with the help of an app and can be done without any wires, even without touching the phone as hackers do use phone cloning to threaten the user for money in return for their data.

WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption

WhatsApp uses end-to-end encryption to encrypt your chats which means no other person except you and the recipient can have access to your chats, not even WhatsApp, as all the data is stored locally on the device itself.

The WhatsApp chats of the celebrities were accessible not because of any issues within the chat app, but because of the cloning process. After the process completes, as the accounts are copied to the new phone and the cloud backup is linked with that account, the backup of the chats can be retrieved from the cloud, whether it is iCloud or Google Drive.

All of this means that you need not to worry about phone cloning as the process is a different one. It can be done wilfully but is illegal when done otherwise.