How to hide images from Gallery in Android?

Privacy is an individual’s right to personal autonomy, dignity and protection. An unwanted disclosure of personal data like photos can not only affect the person’s behavior and reputation, but also makes the data prone to misuse or abuse. Why not hide images?

Does privacy of your photos bother you while sharing your phone with family, friends, and more importantly, acquaintances? What if they access your phone’s gallery, peeking at images that you don’t wish to be seen by others? One can avoid the breach by hiding such pictures, moving them out of the access zone, or securing them with a password.

With regard to barring the pictures from unnecessary glance, Android users can put following options to use:

1. Move images to a folder
This requires you to have a file manager installed on your device. File managers usually offer features like backup, organizing, storing, streaming, compressing and moving files or folders. Users usually have such an app on their device, but if that’s not the case with you, just download any of the free apps like Android file manager, File Explorer, ASUS File Manager, ASTRO File Manager from Play Store. Once you have downloaded the app, follow these instructions:

• Open the file manager



• Add a new folder
• Give it a name of your choice (like personal stuff, classified, important etc.)



• Open your phones Gallery and select the pictures that you wish to keep confidential
• Move the pictures into the newly-created folder.

Shifted files will no longer show in the Gallery.

Note: Keep in mind that photos in file manager will not be password protected, until of course, the app offers such a feature by default.

2. Create a Hidden Folder:
File manager can also be used to hide files and folders. Navigate your files to a folder that does not have anything to do with pictures, by creating a hidden folder. This process varies from device to device. Use the following instructions to create a hidden folder:

• Open your file manager and create a new folder
• Name the folder (tip: use an unpredictable name like ‘files’) and mark a period (for example: ‘.files’) while naming, to make it hidden



• Being a hidden folder it will not be displayed while browsing or scanning the file manager contents
• This way, while others won’t be able to see the folder, you can easily access it by enabling the ‘show hidden files’ option (or something similar) in the file manager app.



• Next, move the pictures you want to hide to the newly-created folder.
• Once you have successfully shifted photos to the folder, make it hidden again.

Though multiple third party apps offer to pin/password protect the photos and other desired data, the steps mentioned here are good enough if the aim is to just hide images from unnecessary glances.