You uninstalled a photo vault app, reinstalled it, and the photos are not there. Or the phone was reset. Or an update wiped the vault. It is the same problem underneath, and it is worth understanding before you start downloading recovery tools that will not help.
Where vault apps actually put your photos
When you hide a photo, the app encrypts it and writes it somewhere. That “somewhere” is the whole story, and most apps do not tell you which one they picked.
The common choice is app-private storage, at /data/data/<package>/. It is easy to build against, no permissions needed, and no other app can read it. It also has one property nobody mentions in the store listing: Android deletes that directory when the app is uninstalled. Not to the bin. Not recoverable with root unless you had root before it happened. Gone.
Some apps write to an external folder instead, often a hidden one like /.vault/ or something under /Android/media/. Those survive an uninstall. Whether you can do anything with them depends on where the encryption key lives, which is usually back in app-private storage.
That is the trap. The files survive and the key does not.
Check these four things before you give up
In this order, because the first two take a minute and occasionally just work.
- Google Photos bin. Sixty days. If you hid photos that had already synced, the originals may still be sitting there. Open Google Photos, Library, Bin.
- The app’s own recovery option. Some vaults keep a cloud copy and will restore it if you sign back in with the same account. Look for “restore”, “recover” or “backup” in settings before you do anything else, because a fresh setup can overwrite what is left.
- A file manager, looking for leftovers. Enable “show hidden files” and look for a folder named after the app, or one starting with a dot. Also check
/Android/media/. If you find encrypted blobs, keep them. Do not delete anything yet. - Any backup made before you hid them. A phone-to-phone transfer, a Samsung Smart Switch archive, an old SD card. The photo existed in a normal gallery at some point.
The honest part
If the app stored everything in private storage and you uninstalled it, the files are not recoverable. No recovery app on the Play Store gets them back, whatever the screenshots claim. Those tools scan for deleted files in areas they can read, and app-private storage is not one of them.
We would rather say that than sell you a maybe.
How Secure Folder is built to survive this
When you set up Secure Folder, it asks you to pick a folder using Android’s own folder picker. Everything goes there: the encrypted files, and a small key file that holds the vault key wrapped with your recovery PIN.
Because the folder is yours and not the app’s, uninstalling the app does not touch it. Reinstall, point it at the same folder, enter the same PIN, and the vault rebuilds itself from what is in that folder. The app does not need its old database, because the file names, types and thumbnails are stored inside the encrypted files themselves.
There is also a prompt on the way out. If you turn on the optional device-admin protection, Android will not let the app be uninstalled until that protection is switched off, and switching it off is what triggers Secure Folder to offer to move your hidden photos back to your gallery first. It is a small thing that catches the most common version of this mistake.
What still loses your files
Two things, and neither of them has a workaround.
Deleting the folder. It is a normal folder. If you clear it out while tidying up storage, or format the SD card it sits on, the files go with it. Pick somewhere you will not clean up by accident, and consider turning on the encrypted Google Drive backup.
Forgetting the PIN. The key is derived from your PIN with PBKDF2 at 200,000 iterations. That is deliberate, and it is what makes guessing the PIN slow for anyone who gets hold of the folder. It also means there is no reset link and no support ticket that recovers it. We do not have your PIN and there is no server that does.
Worth knowing the other side of that: a four-digit PIN is still only ten thousand combinations. The iteration count makes each guess expensive, not impossible. Secure Folder accepts up to twelve digits and it costs you nothing to use more than four.
Common questions
Will my photos survive a factory reset?
Only if the vault folder is on removable storage that you take out first, or you turned on the encrypted Drive backup. A factory reset wipes internal storage, folder and all.
Do I need the same phone?
No. Copy the vault folder to the new phone, install Secure Folder, point it at that folder and enter the same recovery PIN. The phone-lock unlock method does not transfer, because it is tied to the original device’s keystore, but the PIN route does.
Can Google read the Drive backup?
The files are encrypted on the phone before they are uploaded, so what arrives in Drive is unreadable without your PIN, and the app can only see its own backup folder rather than the rest of your Drive. Your PIN is never uploaded.
Why not just use a hidden folder or .nomedia?
A .nomedia file hides photos from the gallery scanner. It does not encrypt anything, and any file manager shows the folder in seconds. It is fine for keeping clutter out of your camera roll and useless against someone actually looking.
Get Secure Folder free on Google Play, or read more about how the app lock and vault work.