iPhone fact and fiction

HENLEY DOHERTY | Asst. BUSINESS EDITOR | THE USD VISTA | @hensolo_

There are a lot of myths circulating around about how to break into a locked iPhone or see someone’s old Snapchats. Frankly, it’s slightly concerning to me how many people are so keen on trying to break into others’ phones and private spheres. While nine out of 10 times these so-called iPhone hacks end up being completely fake, there are some simpler and lesser known tricks to use with your iPhone that won’t have you breaking into others.

When taking a picture, after you set the exposure by tapping the screen, all too often you end up losing the focus you set when you move your phone. Instead, hold your finger down on the screen until a yellow bar shows up at the top. This locks the focus and exposure you set, even if you then move your camera around.

If you worry about using up your cellular data too quickly, go into your iPhone’s settings and click on Cellular. Scroll down and you’ll see a list of all of your apps, and from there you can select which apps you want to allow to use cellular data. This will allow your data to last until the end of every month. You probably don’t use most of the apps on your phone regularly, so it doesn’t make sense for them to be using up data anyways.

Another feature is the search bar at the top of Messages. You can not only search for contacts but for specific text messages themselves, so when you’re arguing with someone about who said what in a past conversation, instead of scrolling through endless texts, you can pull the evidence up on the spot.

In this situation, timestamps can also become important. Swipe any text to the left and its individual timestamp will appear.

One final tip I’ll leave you with is how to charge your iPhone faster — and no, this isn’t a myth. Set your phone to Airplane mode and it will be cut off from data usage, allowing your battery to charge much more quickly, especially if your background brightness is set to minimum.