Apple Tip: How to restore your contacts

Whether it’s absent mindedness or a slip of the finger, you may find yourself accidentally deleting a contact or two. No need to fear though if you’ve got backup enabled on your iCloud. Here’s how you can recover your contacts…

1. Log into your iCloud account using your Apple ID

2. Scroll down to where it says Advanced and click on Restore Contacts

3. Then select an archive of your contacts that was from a date before you had accidentally removed/lost the contacts

How To: Using iOS 12's Passwords & Accounts Tool to Autofill

Okay, let’s be honest here, we’re all a little bit aware that we tend to forget our passwords especially with so many multiple logins. The good thing is that Apple has made it easier for us by giving us iCloud Keychain, which helps to store our usernames and passwords safely.

STORING YOUR PASSWORDS is pretty easy with Apple iCloud Keychain. All you have to do is log in to one of your apps or a website and a pop-up will ask if you want to save these login details to your iCloud Keychain. Select Save Password and voila! Your details are now added to your Keychain.

If you want to view your stored passwords in your Keychain simply go to your Settings > Passwords & Accounts > Website & App Passwords. Once you’ve confirmed your ID with either Touch/FaceID you’ll be able to see your full list of login info.

CREATING A STRONG PASSWORD is good practice. Most of us are guilty of creating very easy passwords (usually the name of our favourite pet and someone’s year of birth, or the most common, “Password”) iCloud Keychain thankfully has an option to create a strong password for you. So whenever your register for an app or register for anything on Safari, iOS 12 will suggest a Strong Password for you, which is then saved to your Keychain. So the next time your signing up to something new, you’ll see a pop-up which will then have the option “Use Strong Password.”

If this isn’t working for you, check that you have Autofill Passwords enabled. Settings > Passwords & Accounts > Autofill Passwords. Check that you have iCloud Keychain enabled as well.

AUTOFILL your passwords now whenever you’re logging in! Tap on the username or password box when logging into an app or website and if iOS detects that you’ve saved a login for the app or site, it’ll suggest a login just above your keyboard. Once you’ve selected the appropriate login, you just have to confirm using Touch/FaceID and your login details will be automatically filled out. Next step, tap on login!

How easy is that? No more trying to scramble your brain remembering multiple logins and passwords. There are many other apps that can help you with password management. I myself personally use 1Password. It’s a great little app that stores not only just your login details, but also other things such as your bank details, membership card details, credit card details. The sky’s the limit with what you want to store in it. You can check it out here on the app store. If you’re not a fan of a paid subscription though, there are also free alternatives. Explore Apple’s App store and see what you’ll discover!