Question Could my android phone have been silently compromised?

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themedark99

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Thread author
Jul 23, 2026
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Hello everyone,
I am looking for an objective cybersecurity opinion regarding an incident that has been causing me a lot of anxiety.
Device:
Vivo Y20G
Android 11
Android security update: March 2022
Google Play system update: November 2022
My concern: On 7 July, I recorded a private video and later deleted it. Since then, I have been worried that my phone might have been hacked and that the video could have been uploaded without my knowledge.
I have tried to investigate this as objectively as possible. Here are the facts:
Google Play Protect found no harmful apps when I scanned about 2 days later.
Vivo iManager security scan about 10 days later did not detect malware (it only reported that one malicious URL had been blocked).
Root Checker reports that the phone is not rooted.
I found no suspicious installed apps.
I found no suspicious Google account activity.
I checked Chrome downloads, Play Store downloads, and My Files and found nothing suspicious.
GlassWire showed only relatively small upload amounts during the time period I am concerned about (around a few tens of MB, not hundreds of MB). The video itself would have been approximately 200–250 MB.
I did not notice unusual battery drain, overheating, pop-ups, crashes, or other obvious signs of compromise.
The only uncertainty is that I cannot remember with complete certainty whether I permanently deleted the video myself by turning off the "Recently Deleted" option in Vivo's Album app.

My question is:
Based only on these facts, and not on hypothetical possibilities, what is the most likely explanation? Does this evidence suggest a realistic compromise of the phone, or is there insufficient evidence to conclude that the phone was hacked?

Thank you for taking the time to read this.
 
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My concern: On 7 July, I recorded a private video and later deleted it. Since then, I have been worried that my phone might have been hacked and that the video could have been uploaded without my knowledge.
Why exactly do you think that?

Everything you mentioned points that you have completely clean phone. If you're really worried, make a backup and reset device to factory settings as that will completely delete everything.
 
Most probably the feature was on and actually it helps keeping deleted media for 30 days. I remember going to the setting after deleting the video temporarily. But don't remember if I turned that off, because after that my recently deleted file was empty.
 
Because there is an option in my mobile to keep recently deleted media and most probably it was on. I went to that setting after temporarily deleting my video. I just don't remember turning that off. Because after some time my recently deleted section was empty
 
A recycle bin type of feature is very useful because you can mistakenly delete things. I would turn the feature back on,
 
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