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Right now, many apps on your phone are collecting your data and passing it to advertisers without you knowing.
Most free apps make money from advertising. To sell ads effectively, they monitor what you do inside the app, and often what you do in other apps and on other websites too. They use that combined data to build a profile of your interests, then target ads at you. This data is sometimes also sold to tech companies. You cannot stop apps from doing this completely, but you can turn off most of it using settings that already exist on your phone.
Below, we will explore those settings on iPhone and Android, plus the account and browser controls that work alongside them.
What “Tracking” Means
Before changing any settings, it helps to know what you are actually turning off. Two different things happen when you use an app.
The first is data the app collects to function. A weather app needs your location to show local forecasts. A ride-sharing app needs your location to find a driver. This is normal, and stopping it usually makes the app useless.
The second is data from your activity logs across different apps and websites. It may include what you like, search, post, comment on, save, or even replay or view for a long period of time. This happens through advertising identifiers, shared account logins, and tracking code built into apps by ad networks.
Most of the settings in this guide target this second type. These settings won’t stop an app from collecting the data it needs to work, but they will stop companies from connecting your activity across apps and using it to target you specifically.
On iPhone: Turn Off Cross-App Tracking
Since iOS 14.5, Apple requires apps to ask permission before tracking your activity across other companies’ apps and websites. This is called App Tracking Transparency. When an app asks, and you tap “Ask App Not to Track,” it loses access to your device’s advertising identifier and cannot use similar methods to link your activity elsewhere. You can still use the app fully either way.
To review or change permissions you already granted:
- Open Settings.
- Tap Privacy & Security.
- Tap Tracking.
- Turn off tracking for any app listed.
At the top of this same screen, you can turn off “Allow Apps to Request to Track.” Doing this automatically denies all future tracking requests without showing you the prompt.
On iPhone: See What Apps Have Already Collected Data
Apple includes a tool called App Privacy Report that shows how often apps access your data and which internet domains they contact.
- Open Settings.
- Tap Privacy & Security.
- Tap App Privacy Report.
- Tap Turn On App Privacy Report.
The report covers the past seven days, so give it a few days of normal use before checking back. It shows how often each app accessed your location, camera, microphone, contacts, and photos, and which domains each app connected to in the background. If you see an app contacting domains you don’t recognize, or accessing data it has no clear reason to need, it is a good candidate for tighter permissions or deletion.
On iPhone: Review Permissions by Data Type
You can also check permissions by data type instead of by app, which makes it easier to see every app that can access a specific type of information.
- Open Settings.
- Tap Privacy & Security.
- Tap a data type, such as Location Services, Camera, Microphone, or Contacts.
- Review the apps listed and change each one individually.
For location specifically, tap an app and choose Never, Ask Next Time, While Using the App, or Always. For apps that don’t need your exact location, such as a shopping or weather app, turn off “Precise Location” so the app receives only your general area instead of your exact coordinates.
On Android: Delete Your Advertising ID
Android assigns your phone an advertising ID, a code that lets advertisers connect your activity across different apps without knowing your name. You can delete it.
- Open Settings.
- Tap Google.
- Tap All services.
- Find Privacy & security, then tap Ads.
- Tap Delete advertising ID and confirm.
Once deleted, apps that relied on this ID can no longer use it to track you. Menu names shift slightly depending on your phone’s manufacturer and Android version, but this setting is generally found under your Google account or under Privacy in the main Settings app.
On Android: Turn Off Ad Personalization Features
In the same Ads menu, look for Ads privacy or Ad privacy. It lists three separate features, and you can turn off each one on its own:
- Ad topics: estimates your interests based on the apps you use.
- App-suggested ads: lets individual apps build and reuse their own ad profile of you.
- Ad measurement: lets apps report ad performance data back to advertisers.
Turning these off reduces how targeted the ads you see are. It does not reduce how many ads you see, and it does not stop apps from collecting data for their own purposes.
On Android: Review App Permissions
- Open Settings.
- Tap Security & Privacy, then Privacy Controls, depending on your Android version.
- Tap Permission manager.
- Tap a permission type, such as Location, Camera, or Microphone.
- Tap each app and choose Allow, Allow only while using the app, Ask every time, or Don’t allow.
For apps you use rarely, choose “Ask every time” instead of a permanent Allow, so the app has to request access again each time rather than holding it indefinitely. For location, choose approximate location instead of precise location whenever an app does not need your exact position.
Turn Off Tracking on Facebook and Instagram
Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, collects data that other apps and websites send it about your activity, even when you are not using a Meta app. You can see and limit this.
- Open the Facebook or Instagram app, or go to facebook.com.
- Tap your profile icon, then Settings & privacy, then Settings.
- Tap Accounts Center.
- Tap Your information and permissions, then Your activity off Meta technologies.
- Review the apps and websites listed, clear your history, and turn off future activity if you do not want it used for ads.
Adjust Google’s Ad Settings
Google uses your activity across its own apps, such as Search, Maps, and YouTube, along with data from partner sites, to personalize the ads you see. You can review and limit this through My Ad Center.
- Go to myadcenter.google.com and sign in with your Google account, or on Android, open Settings, tap Google, then Manage your Google Account, then Data & privacy, and look for Ad settings under the Ads section.
- Review the topics Google has inferred about you.
- Turn off “Personalized ads” if you don’t want your activity used for ad targeting, or remove individual topics you don’t want included.
Understand Your Browser’s Role
Safari and Firefox block third-party tracking cookies by default, through features called Intelligent Tracking Prevention and Enhanced Tracking Protection. Neither requires you to turn anything on.
Chrome works differently. Google spent years planning to phase out third-party cookies in Chrome, then reversed that decision and will keep supporting them. If you use Chrome and want to block third-party cookies yourself, you can do it manually:
Open Chrome, tap the three-dot menu, go to Settings, tap Privacy and security, tap Third-party cookies, and select Block third-party cookies.
Block Email Tracking Pixels
Many marketing emails include a tiny, invisible image that reports back to the sender when you open the email, along with your approximate location. Apple Mail can block this.
- Open Settings.
- Tap Mail.
- Tap Privacy Protection.
- Turn on Protect Mail Activity.
This hides your IP address from senders and loads remote content privately in the background, so senders cannot tell whether or when you actually opened a message.
Habits That Keep You Protected
A few ongoing habits matter as much as the one-time settings above.
Check an app’s privacy label before installing it. On iPhone, the App Store shows an “App Privacy” section on each app’s page listing what data the app says it collects and whether that data is linked to your identity. On Android, Google Play shows a similar “Data safety” section. Apple or Google independently verifies neither, so treat these labels as a useful starting point rather than a guarantee.
Delete apps you no longer use. Every installed app with active permissions is a potential source of data collection, even one you rarely open.
Keep your phone’s operating system updated. Apple and Google add new tracking protections in system updates, and a phone running an older version does not receive them.
Summary
No single setting stops all tracking, because tracking happens in several separate places: your device, your accounts, and your browser. The settings in this guide cover all three. Working through them takes a few fifteen minutes and meaningfully reduces how much of your activity is linked together and sold. Revisit them every few months, since new apps and accounts reset some of these choices back to their defaults.
