Secret ‘privacy report’ on your iPhone reveals if apps are spying through camera or microphone
YOUR iPhone has an easy-to-miss Privacy Report that can reveal if you’re being spied on.
The clever feature shows when apps are accessing things like your camera or microphone.
You’ll find that it’s usually fine: Instagram will need access to your camera often, for instance.
But you might spot rogue apps taking advantage of iPhone permissions.
If you do, you can instantly cut them off from being able to access sensitive parts of your phone – or even delete them entirely, if you prefer.
“You can turn on App Privacy Report to see details about how often apps access your data,” Apple explains.
“Like your location, camera, microphone, and more.
“You can also see information about each app’s network activity and website network activity, as well as the web domains that all apps contact most frequently.”
HOW TO TURN ON APP PRIVACY REPORT ON IPHONE
Before you can do use it, you’ll need to switch it on.
First, make sure that your iPhone is running iOS 15.2 or later.
Just go to Settings > General > Software Update to check.
Then go to Settings > Privacy & Security > App Privacy Report.
Then simply turn the feature on.
Privacy Report won’t gather any info until you switch it on.
So you’ll need to wait a little bit for information to start populating inside of it.
And if you ever turn it off, it’ll also clear the report data from your iPhone.
HOW TO USE APP PRIVACY REPORT ON IPHONE
Once the report has collected enough data, you’ll be able to check on it at any time.
Just find it by going into Settings > Privacy & Security > App Privacy Report.
You can see apps that are accessing data and sensors, like your camera or microphone.
Tap on one of the apps and then you’ll see the sensor or piece of data that it accessed.
DO A SAFETY CHECK!
Another great tip is to try out Apple's Safety Check feature...
It’s available on any iPhone running iOS 16 or later (check by going to Settings > General > Software Update).
The feature is designed to let you see where your info is being shared – and put a stop to it immediately.
Apple explains: “If your personal safety is at risk, you can use Safety Check on iPhone to quickly stop sharing your information, or to review and update sharing with individual people and apps.
“You can use Safety Check to check who you’re sharing information with, restrict Messages and FaceTime to your iPhone, reset system privacy permissions for apps, change your passcode, change your Apple ID password and more.”
You’ll also need an Apple ID that has two-factor authentication switched on (that’s when you’re asked for log-in info in addition to your password).
Then simply go to Settings > Privacy & Security > Safety Check.
You can instantly see who has access to your info, as well as options to individually revoke that access.
There’s also a more extreme option called Emergency Reset that instantly cuts off all sharing.
Apple says: “Safety Check has an option called Emergency Reset. You use it to immediately stop sharing the items listed above, which includes all types of sharing.
“Emergency Reset also allows you to review and reset settings associated with your Apple ID.”
And if you tap on that, you’ll see the exact timestamps for when it was accessed.
So if you’re noticing strange timestamps that don’t make sense, it’s worth investigating.
This is especially important if you’re using obscure apps with bad reviews – you might have installed something dodgy.
You can also see web domains that have been accessed by apps too.
If you’re uncomfortable with anything you’re seeing, just go back into Settings > Privacy & Security.
Then you can tap on individual permissions like Camera or Health – and revoke apps from accessing them.
And if you’re really worried about an app, you can simply delete it from your iPhone entirely.