Phone Question

[tiredofvampires]

I had a text conversation with someone several months ago that I kept, because it was important to me. I've gone back to it several times to refer to it (it was an upsetting interchange.)

 

Today, I tried to pull it up and see that it's gone. Clear GONE. Not a single text is left from this person, or my replies to them. I know I didn't inadvertently delete it. In fact, now that I'm looking through my phone history, all this person's texts/conversations to me are gone.

 

Is there some kind of app I'm not aware of where someone can hack into my own phone and remove a convo I had with them?

 

Thanks guys.

[sophie274]

What kind of phone?

[tiredofvampires]

Good question! It's definitely not a smartphone...a very basic, non-touch-screen with pull-out QUERTY keypad...and I don't pay for internet access...I'm such a tech dummy, that's about all the info I can give. Is that enough to go on?

 

It's just so weird...because all the other concurrent messages from other people are still there, and predating it.

[sophie274]

Hmm, sounds odd. My mother has that type of phone and so did I when I was living abroad. You definitely had to go through the menu to delete individual messages yourself with the only other option being to clear the inbox completely. I know in some models messages automatically delete after a certain period of time or if more room needs to be made for incoming messages, but then you wouldn't have older messages still on the phone.

 

My only thought is that some messages can be saved to a SIM card and some to the physical phone, so if by some chance they were saved to the SIM card and you changed numbers, that would explain the disappearance.

 

Did this upsetting person by any chance have access to your phone? I'm guessing you would have thought of that if he did, so no, but just asking anyway.

 

I found this disturbing page but got the impression it only applies to smartphones:

 

I'm not a tech expert in the least so hopefully one will come along and illuminate us.

[tiredofvampires]

I know in some models messages automatically delete after a certain period of time or if more room needs to be made for incoming messages, but then you wouldn't have older messages still on the phone.

 

Exactly -- the fact that this conversation I was looking for happened in February, and I still have messages from January and last year (not his) make it seem really fishy.

 

I wouldn't know anything about a SIM card...and even if I did, I didn't change numbers.

 

No, he (and you're right, it was a he) didn't have any access to my phone. Definitely no on that.

 

Thanks for digging up that link. Yikes!! I wouldn't put anything past the technology now, and this person is more tech savvy than me by about an order of 500. I don't know if this is some devious thing that he pulled off, or a fluke that I'm now wrongly attributing to something intentional, but it just seems like, why would everyone else's messages still be there and his are gone.

 

Then there is this, but I don't know if it only applies to smartphones:

 

 

 

and this, which seems to require an iPhone or android:

 

 

 

So it would seem it's POSSIBLE....but yeah, with my type of phone, I can only delete what's on MY phone, on my end, it's not sophisticated. I'm not linked to anyone else's server to do that, and it's not bidirectional in any way. The question is, even if my phone isn't sophisticated, could more sophisticated software overcome it from their end.

 

That certainly would be going the extra mile to expunge me from his life.

 

It just feels really intrusive, this ability. How disturbing. I wonder if there is counter software? I mean, my messages, my privacy. You don't have a right to throw out MY "mail" (and it was my replies as well). And it's also then something to be aware of if you need to save messages as evidence of something. Hopefully, I'm not totally off base here...

 

Thanks for your brainstorms, sophie -- yeah, anyone else with tech expertise, please feel free to chime in!

[treesandbees]

Are any other messages from the same time frame deleted too, or only the exchange with this one person? Because maybe your phone is set for deletion of all old messages after 30 or 60 days, idk. If other messages remain on the phone from others then I would find theirs disappearing entirely suspect of something happening that you had no part of. Sorry can't offer much more, can take your phone in and see if you can retrieve them somehow. Maybe phone company kept them?

[tiredofvampires]

It actually seems that that month (this past February), I see no messages at all, his or anyone else's, but as I'm not a huge texter, I'm not even sure what other texts were there that month. I still have older messages from others though, so it's not like my phone just deleted up to that point. Conversations with others are still there, from before and after that convo.

 

So it's still a mystery. It's probably not worth checking with the phone company, but thanks for the suggestion.

[Jibralta]

I had a phone like that up until last year. It had limited storage capacity for texts and I always had to delete old ones in order to receive new ones. Yours might be set to delete messages automatically.