If you think that someone is tracking your iPhone location and you should stop them from viewing all the places that you visit, then, you have some options that work. But first, make sure that your parents or your partner want to know your GPS location for good reasons.
Otherwise, if that complicates your online privacy and you should not share your location with that person on the phone, then, here is how to stop them from tracking your device even without them knowing about that.
Stopping someone from tracking your iPhone
For safety reasons, some parents or even spouses enable the location-sharing feature on your phone to see where you go and protect you if anything wrong happens. However, that’s not all the time for good reasons. On some occasions, people can track someone’s location for other reasons, which is not that acceptable for many.
Scan your phone for spyware and hidden apps
Why would you even think about the default iPhone location settings when the person might use a hidden monitoring app on your device? In fact, many apps track GPS location, messages, calls, and time on the screen. Even more, many tools can send to the other phone everything you do on your iPhone.
Even worse, you won’t even notice that you’re being monitored 24/7 until they show you the screenshots and videos recorded directly from your own smartphone.
Now, let’s suppose that someone is tracking your location on your iPhone through a hidden App. How can you find that and remove it? Well, you definitely should look for these solutions.
The iPhone is the most secure among others. By using the default security system and features, no one should be able to track your location if you never clicked on a link in messages, emails, or gave your device to someone else. So, if that happens, then, there is a risk of giving access to someone else to install apps on your phone. So they can track your location without your knowledge.
Now, this should be the best way. But without having a powerful security system, you won’t be able to find the secret program your parent or partner hides in your own phone.
For now, find any app on your device that you’re not using and remove it. Then, if nothing happens and all the following location-sharing features are blocked, then you have to use the factory reset option. That should remove all the apps you never installed.
Disable Find My
iPhone comes with the Find My feature that let you get the last location of your iPhone if the battery gets too low. Also, it lets others get your location and, of course. Thus, it’s a way to find the phone when it’s stolen or lost. But if you want to stop sharing your location with people, then you can turn Off the “Find My” easily.
- Go to “Settings”
- Find “Privacy” and click on it
- Click the “Location Services”
- You may prefer to disable that by toggling the button. But that will stop your iPhone from working properly with navigation and other tools. So, it’s better to let it be active. Instead, click on the next one, which is “Location Alers”, and disable that.
- After that, find “Share My Location”
- Make sure these features are disabled: “Find My Device” and “Share My Location”
Mail privacy protection
Until now, you may be wondering why you should think about email when others want to track your location. But what if you know that when you send emails on your iPhone, the person who reads that email can see your real IP address? And so, the location on the Map.
He can do that by typing that IP on online tools and getting your location on the Map. That person could be the same one that you don’t want him to track your location on the cell phone.
Luckily, there is a way to turn off sharing your IP address and stop others from tracking your activity on iPhone’s Mail app. But make sure you have at least the iOS 15, which brings that security feature to life.
- Open your iPhone “Settings”
- Click to “Mail”
- Find “Privacy Protection” and enable it.
Google Maps on iPhone
Many people forget about this important feature and think that Google Maps is only linked to Android devices when it’s not. Google Maps has a feature that allows parents to get the exact location of their kids from the app directly.
However, when the iPhone is not sharing the location, that won’t work. You’ll need to turn on your iPhone’s GPS location many times to access maps or search for something. Then, you may neglect that, and so, your shart sharing your iPhone location, and the other end will track you.
To avoid that issue, it’s recommended to remove the Google Maps app from your phone after turning OFF the location-sharing feature. Other than that, even without the app installed, others can get the location if you’re sharing it with them through your Google account. Here is how to do that.
When there is location tracking using that app or account, you should see the list of people with whom you’re sharing your real-time location. If that’s not the case, you’ll see the location sharing turned off because the apple system is not allowing that. But as I said, this is worth checking as you may forget that others can see where you’re through Google maps and not only using your iPhone.
Use Airplane mode and turn BlueTooth and WiFi OFF
Enabling Airplane mode on iPhone is not enough to stop others from getting your GPS location. iPhone uses WiFi and cellular networks to get your locations. So, it’s recommended to enable the Airplane mode in parallel with disabling WiFi.
That should work in most cases. But it won’t be a good solution as most of us use social media and WiFi is needed.
In addition to that, you have to turn Off Bluetooth, don’t be surprised to know that iPhone tracks your location through one or all the following options if available:
- Cellular network
- GPS
- WiFi
- Bluetooth connections
See how Apps are sharing your location
This is important to know which app is getting your phone location and share it with others. To do that, go to “Settings” as above. Then, go to “Privacy” and “Location Services” again, and you’ll find all the apps on your iPhone that request location sharing with a purple arrow. That means that the app has recently used your location. Just check all the apps there and verify that no app is tracking you.
That’s a good way to tell if someone is using any hidden app on your phone to track your location. So, make sure you check it every time you have doubts about sharing your cell phone location and letting others see where you go or where you’re on the Map.
Conclusion
These are the ways you can use to stop sharing your location on your iPhone and block people from tracking you online even without them knowing about that. That way, you block the iPhone location sharing with others and stop risking your privacy and even security if the person is a stranger who got access to your device.
Meanwhile, it’s also recommended to think about why your loved one will need to track your location. It could be for your own security, and by stopping them from protecting you, you may have issues. For that, I recommend talking with the person who wants to get your GPS location, and he may not even know about that, so, everyone gets clarification that way.
