Where to keep confidential documents on your phone

Passports, driver’s licenses, insurance cards, tax forms, contracts, lab results. Most people photograph them with the camera when they need a copy, so they end up in the same library as holiday photos. That is the most exposed place on the phone for them.

Why the photo library is a poor place for documents

Anyone who can unlock the phone can scroll to them. Even the Hidden album doesn’t need a separate code. Apple’s iPhone guide says the Hidden and Recently Deleted collections are locked by default and unlock “using Face ID, Touch ID, or your passcode.”

The cloud copy uses keys Apple holds, by default. With iCloud Photos on, your library is stored in iCloud. Apple calls its default “standard data protection”: your data is encrypted, but “the encryption keys are secured in Apple data centers so we can help you with data recovery, and only certain data is end-⁠to-⁠end encrypted.” Apple says this lets it decrypt your data on your behalf, for example when you sign in on a new device or restore from a backup.

Sharing can move them further. Apple says photos added to Shared Albums “are stored with standard data protection, as the feature permits albums to be publicly shared on the web.” A document photo dropped into a family Shared Album is not end-⁠to-⁠end encrypted, whatever your other settings are.

Option 1: a locked note with its own password

Apple Notes can lock individual notes, and on iPhone this is the closest built-⁠in thing to a document safe.

• Choose a separate password. Apple says users can unlock a note with the device passcode, “or they can set a separate password specifically for that note.” Pick the separate password. Then knowing your phone passcode is not enough.
• It is end-⁠to-⁠end encrypted. Apple’s Platform Security guide says secure notes are encrypted with a passphrase you provide. A 16-⁠byte key is derived from it using PBKDF2 and SHA-⁠256, and the note and its attachments are encrypted with AES-⁠GCM. After the encrypted records are created, the original unencrypted data is deleted.
• Check the file type. Apple lists images, sketches, tables, maps and websites as attachments that support encryption. Other file types are not on that list.
• It relocks on its own. On iPhone and iPad, the unlocked session closes when Notes has been in the background for more than three minutes.
• Write the password down somewhere safe. If you forget it, Apple says a reset lets you create new secure notes with a new passphrase, but not see the notes you locked before.

Apple’s guide describes the encryption for the separate-password option. It gives no matching detail for notes locked with the device passcode.

After you move a document photo into a locked note, delete it from Photos. It then sits in Recently Deleted for 30 days unless you delete it there too; Apple says you can delete items permanently at any time during those 30 days.

Option 2: Advanced Data Protection for iCloud

Advanced Data Protection (ADP) changes who holds the keys to your iCloud data. Apple says that with it on, “the number of data categories that use end-⁠to-⁠end encryption rises to 25 and includes your iCloud Backup, Photos, Notes, and more.” It has been available since iOS 16.2, iPadOS 16.2 and macOS 13.1. Apple’s support article explains how to turn it on. Read its recovery section first: with ADP on, getting back in depends on your device passcode, a recovery contact or a recovery key.

The trade-⁠offs, in Apple’s words and terms:

• Apple can’t help you recover. “Apple doesn’t have the encryption keys needed to help you recover your end-⁠to-⁠end encrypted data.”
• Web access is off by default. Turning on ADP disables access to your data at iCloud.com, so it is available only on your trusted devices.
• Not everyone can use it. Managed Apple Accounts and child accounts are not eligible. In the UK, Apple’s notice of September 2025 says users who had not already enabled ADP “will no longer have the option to do so.”
• Some things stay outside it. Shared Albums don’t support ADP. Some metadata also stays under standard protection, including whether an item is marked as a favorite, hidden or deleted.

ADP protects the copy in iCloud. It does nothing about someone holding your unlocked phone.

Android: Locked Folder, private space, Secure Folder

• Google Photos Locked Folder keeps items out of the Photos grid, search, albums and other apps with photo access. Its password is your device screen lock, and Google says “You can’t use a different Locked Folder password.”
• Private space (Android 15 and later) is a separate space on the phone for apps. When you set it up, you can tap Use device screen lock or Choose new lock. Choose a new lock. Google says private space is not included in device backups.
• Samsung Secure Folder has its own passcode or biometric lock, and Samsung says Knox encrypts all data stored there. It needs a Samsung Account, which can also reset a forgotten lock. Samsung’s Knox documentation warns that photos synced to Samsung Cloud may reappear in Gallery even after you move them into Secure Folder.

How the options compare

What a vault with its own key adds, and what it can’t do

A vault app that encrypts files with its own key, separate from your phone’s passcode, does for photos and scans what a locked note does for notes. The documents leave the photo library, so they are not in iCloud Photos, not in Shared Albums, and not readable by apps that have photo access. The phone’s passcode does not open them.

What it cannot do:

• Protect what is on screen. Once you open a document to show it at a desk or counter, it is visible like any other image.
• Protect copies you make. A screenshot, an export or a file you send leaves the vault’s protection.
• Recover a lost key for you. If you lose both the code and the recovery method, the documents are gone. That is the cost of a key only you hold.
• Stop malware. Software running on a compromised phone while the vault is open is outside what a vault app can guard against.

Checklist

• Go through your photo library for pictures of IDs, cards and papers.
• Move each one into a locked note with a separate password, or into a vault with its own key.
• Delete the originals from Photos, then from Recently Deleted.
• Keep documents out of Shared Albums.
• If you are eligible, consider Advanced Data Protection, after setting up its recovery options.
• Store the note password or vault recovery phrase somewhere other than the phone.