Link Safe

Your tablet or phone is much easier to lose than your desktop PC, but it’s harder to keep backed up. Android’s open platform makes it easier for developers to design apps that access your data and settings, and this has advantages and disadvantages  it’s easier for malware to get onto your device, so you must use an antivirus app such as Avast Mobile Security (https://play.google.co/MobileSecurity), but it’s also easier to back up your data.

The free version of Avast’s Mobile Backup app (https://play.google.com/MobileBackup) backs up all your text messages, contacts, call logs and photos once a day to your personal account in Avast secure cloud servers. You can change what’s backed up, and how often, in the app’s settings -for example you can set it to run a full  back-up every time you connect to Wi-Fi.You can also save a copy of your backups to Google Drive for extra reassurance.

Access to your account is PIN-protected for extra security, but you can reach it at any time from any Android device if you need to restore your data. The new premium version ($3.40 £2 per month via

in-app subscription) also backs up your apps, music and videos, and includes Avast Mobile Security Premium. Note that there’s a default opt-in for auto-renewal, so make sure to opt out if you’d rather renew your subscription manually.

We'd also recommend installing Malwarebytes’ new Secure Backup app (https://play.google.com/Malwarebytes.backup), which integrates with Malwarebytes Anti-Malware to scan all your mobile data for bugs before encrypting it and backing it up automatically in the cloud.