3

Is it possible to make a call without giving access to the phone's contacts? I.E. say I let a friend use my phone, and lock my contacts such that it requires a pin for access - is there any way to allow a call to an arbitrary number that is not necessarily in the contacts?

1 Answer 1

1

In Android 5, a feature called screen pinning was introduced. The idea is to actually pin an active app screen so that it cannot be quit, no notifications are shown, and so on. Think of this feature as restricting yourself to a single app screen until it is unpinned again. More information can be found here.

To come back to your specific problem: start the call app, pin its screen and hand it out to someone. This person is now able to use the pinned app screen, but cannot switch to another app. If you enable the corresponding setting, this person will also not be able to unpin without knowing your password/pin/pattern.

It should be noted that you need at least Android 5 Lollipop for this.

3
  • 1
    Link seems broken, and I don't have Android 5 yet, but what "dialer" app can actually call with the phone but not have contacts access? Oct 13, 2015 at 14:48
  • Fixed the link. Actually I am not sure if pinning restricts you to the current screen (activity) or the current app, so if it is possible to reach the contacts from the pinned dialer. I don't have a device supporting this at hand, but if you say that you are running an android version below Lollipop, then this is not the solution you are looking for anyway, sorry. Oct 13, 2015 at 14:56
  • Well I will eventually upgrade to android 5, but even with android 4 and others, there are security apps that can "pin-lock" specific apps, so I could just do that to the normal dialer - the question is what app would allow the making of a call without viewing the contacts or requiring the "standard" dialer Oct 13, 2015 at 15:31

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .