Apple iOS7 comes out today, but think twice about updating without backing up your data.
Ross Newman, founder and CEO of iHospital, said backing up phone data is always important, whether a phone is stolen, lost, or just updating to a new operating system.
Newman said it’s rare for an update to cause data loss, but with any major change there are kinks in the system that have to be worked out.
He said to minimize the chance of corrupting a phone’s data, restore it to its factory settings after backing up data and then update the software.
“We always see people when there’s new software coming out who have accidentally wiped their phones,” he said. “Unless they have a recent backup, they’re in trouble.”
Riley Richards, an 18-year-old UF English freshman, said she used to only back up her data every few months until she tried updating her new phone.
“I guess I pressed the wrong sync button and everything was just gone,” she said. “It was pretty stressful.”
Megan Raitano, a 21-year-old UF anthropology senior, said her phone has been wiped several times, but she still only backs up her data once a year at most.
“My photos are automatically backed up to Dropbox,” she said. “Everything else is pretty unimportant to me.”
A version of this story ran on page 3 on 9/18/2013 under the headline "Back up iPhone data before updating to iOS7"
Apple’s iOS7, featuring a new design and new features, comes out today.
This is the lock screen for the iPhone iOS 6.1.4 software system, the last update prior to the iOS 7 release.
