Secret, anonymous messages arent just for the dastardly.
Luckily, a little privacy isnt difficult to get.
Sometimes evil is justified, and other times, knowing evil means knowing how to beat it.
Check out our evil week tag page.
Thats right; were building a ghost phone.
A equipment you’re able to use to generate a phone number and send completely anonymous texts.
Our ghost phone works best over Wi-Fi, preferablynot your Wi-Fi, so you could stay untraceable.
Remember though, not everyone with something important to sayis willing to say it publicly.
Think about how handy itd be to have a ghost phone to sell stuff over Craigslist.
Or maybe youd rather use your ghost phone to screen your online dates.
Maybe you just want to prank your friends.
If any of those sound like you, this is a worthwhile project.
The disposability of an old unit thats doing nothing but acting as a ghost texting phone is important here.
Were recommending Hushed here, butBurner,another app weve covered, is an alternative.
However, it doesnt have the same free trial or pay-as-you-go plans.
Its free though, which is nice.
Heres how youll set everything up.
How to Install and Configure Hushed
Were recommendingHushedfor your anonymous, disposable phone number.
$4 lets you keep the number for a month and gives you 150 texts.
Installing Hushed is as easy as grabbing it from Google Play or the iTunes App Store.
You could also usepreviously mentionedAPK Downloaderto get the installer package and sideload it onto your Android phone.
From there, setup is easy.
Hushed uses an email address and a password you create after installing, but they dont verify email addresses.
They dont even have a record of whether the address is real or not.
Now youre ready to send some totally private, anonymous texts.
Tap the menu icon on the left side of the screen to slide out the sidebar.
Hushed supports text and picture messages, as well as voice calls over Wi-Fi.
Thats wherea good mobile VPNcomes in.
BothCyberGhostorHidemanadd a cozy wrapper of encryption to all of the data leaving your ghost phone.
They dont require an account to use, either, which is perfect.
First, install your VPN of choice from iTunes or Google Play.
Choose a location to connect to.
Faraway servers make it tougher to track you down, but connectivity will suffer.
Once youve selected one, click Connect.
Once youre connected, head back to Hushed, and start sending your messages.
Your phone does have limitations that you should be aware of, though.
For example:
This will not protect you from Notoriously Strong Adversaries.
In short, dont be stupid.
Putting down money and using real accounts makes you traceable.
This is also why Google Voice is a bad idea for this particular use case.
You could use Bitcoin, but you have to buy the Bitcoin somehow, right?
As always, use your evil powers for goodor at least wisely.
Title image made usingolegganko(Shutterstock).
