The truth is, despite what so many guys seem to think, taking your phone into the bathroom for half an hour to “answer emails” is not sly. Unless you’ve been doing that for years, suddenly starting up shady behavior and trying to cover it up with classic excuses like vague, “business-related” reasons is going to immediately alert your wife that you’re up to something. Instead, you’re going to want to be a little more cautious with how you talk to your girlfriend (or girlfriends) and the methods you use to clean up after yourself. Here are a few tips for staying out of trouble with a snooping partner.

Don’t Act Unusually, Even if You Think You’re Being Nicer

Any sudden extreme attitude changes will come off as red flags. Even if that sudden change comes in the form of more affection, better sex, and giving gifts to your wife, she’s going to notice and think of it as suspicious behavior. No one changes like that without a reason. Instead, keep to your normal schedule. If you’ve never answered “business emails” in the bathroom before, don’t claim to start now. If you almost always phone your boss and have never texted them before, don’t claim the person you’re texting is your boss. Never underestimate how many of your daily nuances your wife has picked up on, especially if your marriage has lasted for years. Living with someone really clues you in to their normal behavior, so even if you’re unhappy together, she’s going to notice if you start acting out of the ordinary.

Erase Your Internet History without Wiping it Totally

Unless you are already in the habit of clearing out your Internet history, don’t start suddenly deleting your entire history after a chat online with your girlfriend on the side. If your wife DOES decide to snoop, an empty history is suspicious because it lets her know you were paranoid enough to delete your history, and must have had a motive. Instead be selective with what you erase and only get rid of websites that would give you away. It’s also important that you don’t just open a window, head straight to your site of choice to talk with your girlfriend, and then delete your history and call it quits. While you’re talking, open up tabs for your other frequented sites like Facebook, your email, any research or business related sites, and even just funny websites to fill up your history. This way there won’t be a blank space at a time when you were online if your wife thinks to check later.

Keeping Things Secret on Your Smartphone

If you have an older phone with less customization, you’ll be out of luck and unable to toggle your ability to show or hide text message previews that appear on your home screen or in your alert bar. If you have an iPhone, you’ll have a lot of room to tweak your settings and keep your conversations private no matter who you’re with. It can be an absolute catastrophe if you leave your phone on a table at home, it rings with a naughty text from your girlfriend, and your wife reaches to pick up the phone and hand it to you. Your girlfriend’s name and half, if not all, of her message broadcasts right on the home screen for all to see and is a terrible way to get your cover blown. Instead, go into your settings and change your notification preferences. You will be able to turn off the text alert sound as well as the preview on the home screen. If you have an Android phone and don’t use Apple products, there’s still hope. Download an app like Shady Contacts that will make accessing your SMS alerts (including text and missed calls) password protected. You can also hide the app icon on your phone (don’t want a nosy spouse seeing an app called “Shady Contacts”) and dial a special number on your phone to access it instead.

Keep a Separate Facebook Account

If you’re worried about your girlfriend getting in touch with you on Facebook, where the chances of getting caught by a snooping spouse are incredibly high, you can simply create a second Facebook account to talk on. That way you can use all of Facebook’s chat features and even play and share games with your girlfriend if you’re so inclined, log out, and clear your cache to prevent the fake account’s email from showing up in the “suggested” box when someone else goes to log in later on. The amount of effort you put into this Facebook will depend on your relationship with your girlfriend, and whether or not she knows that you’re already married. You may want to create one privately for her and not even bother with adding fake friends, or you could spend time crafting a new identity online to show off for your girlfriend. As long as you’re careful about erasing your history and cache, you’ll be fine.