While many people today can’t wait to get their hands on the latest smartphones on the market, there is another segment of the population that likes to use their mobile phones until the device is completely broken and dead. Sure, the second category of people are saving money while being more environmentally friendly, but they’re also putting themselves at risk of all kinds of cyber attacks that can have long-term financial and emotional consequences.

Here, we’ve explained the dangers of using very old mobile phones.

It lacks security updates

If you’re using a smartphone, you’ve probably already received one or more security patch updates till now. A security patch is a software update from the phone manufacturer to fix all the known vulnerabilities in a particular mobile phone model. Since cybercriminals are relentlessly searching for new ways to circumvent the security on mobile phones, phone-makers are required to keep fixing security holes now and then.

However, most manufacturers stop sending out patch updates after two or three years (about five years in the case of Apple devices), making the mobile phones significantly less secure. If you weren’t aware, security vulnerabilities become common among the hacker community every few weeks or months, putting users of unsupported phones at higher risk of hack attacks. As a result, even phone-makers drop older models from update cycles, as each model requires constant threat assessment and patching, which is a lot of work and needs significant financial investment on the manufacturer’s end.

It’s not protected against cybercriminals

When a device stops receiving security updates, it becomes highly vulnerable to cyberattacks. If a hacker breaks into your phone, they can spy on you and steal your private data, including contacts, emails, photos and videos, banking details, search engine history, and text messages. This can make you susceptible to identity theft. There have been countless cases where hackers have exploited security vulnerabilities to obtain the personal information of random phone users and applied for credit cards and loans.

Many hackers even hack online shopping accounts and charge purchases to the owner’s account. Today, a large percentage of mobile phone users prefer keeping their private information on their devices for easy access, so it’s important to use relatively new devices that are guarded against cyber attacks. It’s crucial to understand that mobile phones are considered “old” from the day they stop receiving software and security updates.