Is it proper to check your partner’s phone?

Your cell phone can be a helpful or a disruptive communication tool. You can use it to connect with your spouse (through calls, text messages, or emails, which are additional ways to show you’re thinking of him or her). But how you use the device can make or mar your relationship.

The rising number of broken homes and relationships in our society is often blamed on infidelity. Many people attribute this to the unwholesome things they see in their partners’ phones. An old adage says ‘what you do not know won’t kill you.’ While this may be true in some cases, it can also be untrue in others depending on the situation. The question is: Is it proper to check your partner’s phone? Respondents have varying but quite interesting views on this rather contentious issue as presented below.
Nurudeen Abubukar, a businessman who is married, said: “The idea of spouses checking each other’s phone is no big deal. But on a second thought if there is some level of trust between the couple, there is no need for it.”
Blaming phone snooping among couples on infidelity, he stressed that: “The reason why most partners check each other’s phone is to see if there is any suspicious activity that they may not know about, especially with infidelity. But if that trust exists between them, there wouldn’t be any need for ‘investigation.’”
Adaobi Okoye, a cake designer who is engaged to be married, concurred with Abubakar that there is no big deal about partners checking each other’s phones as long as both have nothing to hide. “I believe that when both of them agreed to be in a relationship, they accepted to share everything together and be a part of each other’s lives,” she noted. “That being said, they should both know everything about each other and share a lot of things. If going through your partner’s phone is not allowed then there is more to it.”
Okoye explained that some people allow their siblings to go through their phones because they see their them as part of their lives hence they have nothing to hide from them, adding that the case should not be any different from one’s partner. “The moment both of you agree to a relationship to the extent of tying the knots, you both become a part of each other, therefore nothing to should be hidden, including your phone. If one is hiding the phone from the partner then there is more to it,” she stressed.
Mariam Mohammed, a businesswoman, also thinks there is nothing wrong with snooping on your partner’s phone. “As a couple, they are one; therefore they shouldn’t hide anything from each other. As such checking each other’s phone shouldn’t be a problem,” Mohammed remarked.
But Charles Ndubusi, a banker who is still single, believes in setting boundaries. “The moment you begin checking your spouse’s phone, you would start to anticipate so many things and this may lead to reading meanings that don’t even exist. Yes you are married but you should have some form of restriction,” he said. “For example, your spouse’s job may require working with his or her phone. What if in the process of checking her phone you mistakenly delete some files. What then happens?”
Ndubusi added that: “Or maybe some of your husband’s clients are women and while checking his phone, you see female contacts who he works with. You’ll start having ideas. So sometimes it’s best if the couple save themselves a lot of stress and unnecessary heart break because what you see may not even be what you think.”
Chinyere Akalugwu, who is also single, gave to two opinions. She said the phone is like a personal diary which ought to be kept private, adding that though a couple are two people who have agreed to be one and break the walls of privacy and secrecy, they are still two separate people. Therefore, little personal areas like smartphones should be respected.
“I believe anyone searching his or her partner’s phone should do so with permission and whereby you do not get permission, you are violating your spouse’s rights,” she remarked.
Majority of the respondents submitted that it is better not to check your partner’s phone so that you don’t get ‘hurt,’ and stressed that it is better you don’t bother yourself about anything as long as your partner is not acting in a suspicious manner.