Enhance Your iPhone Security Now with Contact Key Verification

2024-07-05 11:34:58

While waiting for Apple to launch iOS 18 This fall, you could give your iPhone a security boost now. Apple released iOS 17.2 in December and that update included a popular security tool called Contact Key Verification. The tool is meant to help verify that the person you’re texting is who they say they are, and you can activate it in four steps.

Enter Apple December 2022 With Contact Key Verification, people who may be in dangerous situations, such as journalists, activists, and members of government organizations, can verify that they are sending messages to whoever they want. While most people won’t be attacked that way, Apple wrote that the tool provides an important layer of security for those who would.

Read more: All the features iOS 18 could bring to your iPhone this fall

This is how to enable contact key verification and how to use the new security feature. Please note that both you and the person you are sending the message to must be enabled for it to work properly.

How to enable contact key verification

1. Open Arrangements.
2. contact your Apple ID (your name and photo) near the top of your screen.
3. Tap Contact key verification near the bottom of the menu.
4. Tap the switch next to Verification in iMessage.

You will then see a splash screen explaining Contact Key Verification. Tap continue on on this screen.

You may see another splash screen indicating that you need to update some of your devices to activate the feature. You can contact Okay and then update the devices, or you can tap Delete devices in settings. You should probably update your devices even if you don’t plan to use contact key verification.

Verify your own identity and that of others.

After you enable the feature, the Contact key verification There will be a new option called the menu Show public verification code. Tap this new option and you’ll see a string of letters, numbers and symbols. This code is how people confirm they are messaging you.

screenshot by Zach McAuliffe/CNET

Then tap Copy verification code about your code, and you can paste it wherever you want to share it, for example in a message or online. Now other people can verify that they are messaging you, and if your code doesn’t match your code online, you’ll know that you might not be talking to the right person.

Generate codes in Messages

You can also generate a code with someone directly in Messages. This is a quick way for you and another person to verify identities and devices at the same time, but you and the other person must have Contact Key Verification enabled for this to work.

If you both have the tool enabled, here’s how you generate code directly in Messages.

1. Open Messages.
2. Start a conversation with someone or jump to the right conversation.
3. Tap the person’s name at the top of the conversation.
4. Tap Verify contact near the bottom of the menu.

Next, compare the six-digit codes generated on the two devices. If the codes match, tap Mark as verified, then tap Update on the next screen. Now the code will be associated with that person’s contact card and a checkmark will appear next to their name in Messages.

If the codes do not match, tap No match. You may not be communicating with the right person and you should stop messaging them until you can verify their identity.

For more information on iOS 17, here’s what it could include iOS 17.6 and our iOS 17 cheat sheet You can also check out what you know about iOS 18 so far and everything Apple announced at WWDC 2024.