Which apps are tracking me? How to check and stop it on Android and iPhone
Your phone’s own settings show which apps have used your location, camera and microphone. They do not show the hidden trackers inside apps, which report what you do to advertising companies. To see those you need a tool that watches the connections each app makes, such as BLOKK’s Activity screen. Then you can block them.
By Archie Crossland, Head of Product and Growth at BLOKK. Updated 10 November 2026.
Two kinds of tracking
| Permissions | Trackers inside apps | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | An app using your location, camera, microphone, contacts or photos | Code from outside companies inside the app, reporting what you do |
| Who sees the data | The app’s maker | Advertising and analytics companies you never chose |
| Can phone settings show it? | Yes | Mostly no on Android. Partly on iPhone |
| Can phone settings stop it? | Yes, switch the permission off | No |
Most guides stop at permissions. The second column is where most tracking happens.
How to see which apps use your location, camera and microphone
On Android. Open Settings, tap “Security and Privacy” or “Privacy”, then “Privacy dashboard”. Google says it shows “which apps are accessing data, which permissions apps are using, and when that access is happening”. It covers the last 7 days on Android 13 and the last 24 hours on Android 12.
On iPhone. Open Settings, tap Privacy & Security, scroll down to App Privacy Report and turn it on. Apple says its “Data & Sensor Access” section “displays how many times and when an app accessed privacy-sensitive data”. It covers the past seven days and needs iOS 15.2 or later.
If an app has used something it has no reason to need, take the permission away.
How to see the trackers inside your apps
On iPhone, partly. The same App Privacy Report has a section called App Network Activity, which Apple says “displays domains that have been contacted either directly or from content within an app”. It shows you the addresses. It does not tell you which are trackers, and it does not block them.
On Android, not with built in settings. You need an app that watches connections:
- BLOKK. Activity lists each app on your phone and what it tried to contact, and marks what was blocked. Map of Your Data shows the countries and companies those connections were heading for. Free, no account.
- DuckDuckGo App Tracking Protection. A feature inside the DuckDuckGo browser for Android that DuckDuckGo says “helps block 3rd-party trackers in your apps, even when you’re not using them”.
- TrackerControl. An open source Android app that, in its makers’ words, lets you “discover the tracking software in your apps, understand the companies behind it, and take control”.
How to stop apps tracking you
- Remove permissions an app does not need. Location set to “only while using the app” instead of “always” is the biggest single change.
- Delete or reset your advertising identifier. On Android it is under Privacy, in the Ads section. On iPhone, choose “Ask App Not to Track” when an app asks, or switch off “Allow Apps to Request to Track” in Privacy & Security, under Tracking.
- Delete apps you no longer use. An app you never open can still send data.
- Block the trackers. Steps 1 to 3 limit what apps can collect. They do not stop the tracking code inside an app from reporting what it already has. A tracker blocker refuses those connections before they leave your phone.
What a tracker blocker changes
A tracker blocker uses the phone’s VPN permission to check each connection against a list of known tracking addresses, on the phone itself. When an app tries to reach one, the connection is stopped. The app carries on working in nearly every case. Blocking trackers also stops many adverts loading, because they arrive through the same addresses.
BLOKK’s Privacy Shield does this in every app and browser, using a list of more than 7 million domains on Android, and blocks known scam websites with the same list. If one app misbehaves, you can pause BLOKK, and on Android you can switch it off for that app alone.
How do I know it is working?
Open BLOKK’s Activity after an hour of normal use. You will see the apps on your phone, in order of how much they tried to send, and what was stopped. Most people are surprised by which apps are at the top.
Download BLOKK on Google Play or download BLOKK on the App Store.
