The present invention provides a device control method and apparatus, which are applied to a terminal. The control method includes: obtaining an operation rhythm characteristic presented when an operation gesture passes through at least one preset region on a touchscreen of the terminal; matching an operation rhythm characteristic of each preset region against a corresponding preset rhythm characteristic to obtain a matching result; and when matching results of all preset regions meet an execution condition, controlling the terminal to execute a preset action corresponding to the operation gesture. Generally, different users have more or less different operation rhythm characteristics when performing an operation gesture in each preset region. Therefore, even though the operation gesture is leaked out due to a cause such as hitting the library, peeping, or smearing, an attacker cannot perform a preset operation on the terminal by taking advantage of the operation gesture that was leaked out. That is, technical solutions of the present invention can reduce a risk of compromising privacy of a user stored in a terminal.