Fortunately, you can greatly improve your privacy by tweaking a few settings and taking some easy steps. These include:
Tweaking your Ads settings Configuring your location tracking settings Managing your app’s permissions to access data, sensors and hardware Uninstalling apps you don’t use (anymore) Revising which apps access your Google account Turning off locked screen notifications Using a VPN, such as Surfshark.
In the United States, this translates to over 130 million people with an Android phone in their pocket each day. And yet, most people don’t know much about Android privacy at all. While most of us value the convenience and service provided on our Android phones, many may be unaware of the risks of not taking Android privacy seriously. By tweaking your Android device’s settings and taking some other steps, you can ensure your Android privacy is better protected.
Why Worry About Android Privacy?
With Android being the largest smartphone device operating system, and Google being such a recognized name, you may think there are no concerns about privacy using their products. Unfortunately, a simple reading of Android’s privacy policy reveals much to concern privacy experts. Google’s Privacy Policy spells out the fact that your Android device will collect information including the content of email, photos, and videos, like other privacy policies. They also track how you use apps, games, and browsers on the device. Moreover, Google collects information about search terms, how you interact with ads, who you call and how long you talk to them. Android monitors your location via GPS, the sensors in your device, nearby WiFi networks, cell towers, and Bluetooth devices. All this information is collected to improve their services. Google especially wants to improve on better targeting for advertisers. Google can charge more if they’re able to show ads to very specific groups of people. The majority of Google profits from Android come from advertising based on information gathered about you from your device.
Ads Settings
Taking charge of the Ads Settings on your Android device is one of the best steps you can take to secure your personal data.
To do this, follow these steps:
Location Tracking Settings
One of the more sneaky ways Android builds a profile of your interests for advertisers is through tracking your location. In many ways, this can be a nightmare for those concerned about their privacy. By tracking where your Android device is at all times, Google can determine your home and work locations, where you frequently shop, who your doctor is, where your kids go to school and many other private details. Adjusting your location settings can help keep your data private. Here’s how you can do that:
Manage App Permissions – Android Privacy Settings
When you install any app on your device, that app will often need certain permissions, such as accessing your camera or location. The app needs these permissions for (some of) its features to work, which often encroaches upon your Android privacy preferences. While you do not have to agree to all the permissions requested, often the app will not work as well if you don’t. Moreover, a lot of simple apps which only serve one specific purpose don’t work at all if you don’t give it the permission(s) it claims to need. For this reason, most people simply agree to whatever permission requests an app makes on installation.
Some apps abuse the “permission system”
Many programs take advantage of “the permission system” by asking for Android app permissions which are not required to fulfill their functions. This can include accessing contact lists, your microphone, camera, or other apps. It can be a good idea to go through your apps to check the permissions granted and perhaps revoke some that don’t seem to be required.
If we look at the camera app, we see it has access to “Camera” for obvious reasons. Moreover, it has access to your “Location” to tag your photo with where it was taken if you choose that option. The camera also has access to the “Microphone” so you can use voice control to tell your phone when to snap the photo. Finally, the app has access to “Storage” so it can save the photos you take on your device. To disable any of these, toggle the slider to “Off.” While it is obvious why the camera needs access to “Camera”, other Android app permissions may not be so obvious. Turning off a required permission could cripple your app. No need to panic if that happens! Simply come back to the application and re-enable the necessary permission.
Uninstall Unused Apps
This is quite an obvious step, but an important one nonetheless. If you don’t use an app (anymore), it will only hog battery and CPU resources, putting an undue load on your system. Even more importantly, unused apps often still access (sensitive) data on your device. Why would you allow this if you’re no longer benefiting from the service the app offers? To better protect your Android privacy, it’s best to uninstall apps that are no longer in use.
Revise Which Apps Can Access Your Google Account
Apart from accessing data on your device, some apps also have access to information associated with your Google account. They might have access to your Google Drive or Gmail for instance. Fortunately, it’s easy to revise which apps have this access and to revoke it. Simply go to your Google account permissions page and check out the apps you find there. Click on an app and select “remove access,” if you want to revoke an app’s permission to access your Google account.
Improve Your Android Privacy By Securing Your Lock Screen
Even if your screen is locked, Android often shows many notifications. Some of these might be privacy-sensitive. Anyone who picks up your phone and presses the lock-screen button can see these notifications. Fortunately, it’s quite easy to change this: Depending on your device, there might be some minor variations. On Samsung devices, for instance, you’ll have to go to the separate “Lock Screen” portion of your system settings and click on “Notifications.” There’ll you’ll find similar options. Within the MIUI Android version used by Xiaomi, you go to “Settings” > “Lock screen notifications.” Here you can choose whether to show lock screen notifications and in what format. Furthermore, you can specify which apps are able to show lock screen notifications.
Use A VPN
Using a VPN is a great way to improve your privacy on Android and all your other devices. After all, one of the main ways that online parties identify you is by looking at your IP address. By knowing this address, they can track you with ease and keep tabs on basically anything you do. This is where a VPN comes in. A VPN changes your “real” IP address by connecting you to one of its servers. These servers have their own IP address which you will be using to surf the web once you connect to them. By regularly changing VPN servers — a process that generally happens automatically if you just connect to the fastest server – you can prevent online parties from spying on you by tracking your IP address. We greatly recommend Surfshark to improve your privacy on your Android phone or tablet and your other devices. After all, Surfshark is very affordable, the fastest VPN we have tested, and offers great privacy.
Android 12 Privacy Settings And Features
Android 12 has been out since October 2021 and while not available on all Android devices yet, it seems to be a great update for those who value their privacy. Some of its privacy features include its new privacy dashboard and its camera and microphone indicator. The control Android 12 offers over the accuracy of your location data is a great addition as well. Below we’ll discuss Android’s 12 privacy updates in more detail.
Privacy dashboard
Google came up with Android 12’s privacy dashboard to give people more insight and control over what data applications can access. This dashboard shows you exactly what data, which phone sensors, and hardware different apps use and access. For instance, by clicking on the camera or microphone tab, you’ll see a list of all of the apps which use these two features of your phone. You’ll also get to see a timeline showing when exactly these apps were using your camera or microphone. Finally, the circle diagram shows you how many applications actually actively use their permissions. If you see something you don’t like, which should be quite easy thanks to the clear structure of the privacy dashboard, you can easily change it. At the bottom of the page, you’ll see a button saying “Manage Permissions.” By clicking on it, you can easily change your Android app permissions. Don’t like the fact that an application is unnecessarily gathering information on your contacts? That’s easy to solve with the Android 12 Privacy Dashboard.
Camera and microphone indicator
Obviously, it’s great to have a privacy dashboard telling you which apps are accessing what data and parts of your phone. However, some parts of your phone require a bit more urgency as far as privacy is concerned. When it comes to your camera and microphone, you ideally want to get live feedback on what apps are using them. This is where Android 12’s camera and microphone indicator comes in. Whenever your camera and/or microphone are active, you’ll see a little green indicator in the top right corner of your screen. Within this little green field will appear a camera and/or microphone icon, depending on what’s in use. By tapping on the indicator, you can see what application(s) is/are using them. This makes it very easy to turn off an application or alter its permissions before serious privacy infringements occur. And, that brings us to our next point.
Shortcuts to revoke camera and microphone permissions
The new camera and microphone indicator are only useful if users can actually do something with the information this feature gives them. Fortunately, Android 12’s developers have thought this true. By using your phone’s “Quick Settings” you can easily and very swiftly limit the camera and microphone permissions of whatever app is using them. In order to access these settings, simply swipe from the top to the bottom part of your screen. Just like you would do with any other version of Android.
Managing location data
Android 12 offers users more control over who they share (highly accurate) location data with. Apps might request permission to access your location for different reasons. The most obvious examples probably include navigation apps like Google Maps, which take you from A to B. But applications that tell you what the weather is like and show you local news or products purchasable in your area also require access to your location. Of course, you might ask yourself if it’s really necessary that all of these apps know your exact location. Arguably, some of these applications, such as weather apps, can operate just fine knowing the city you’re in. Even if it’s a particularly large or geographically varied city, knowing the neighbourhood you’re in will probably do just fine. Whenever you launch an app that requires location data, Android 12 will ask you to choose between “Precise” and “Approximate.” If you choose “Precise”, the app will know your exact location, with an error margin of a few meters. But if you choose “Approximate”, the app will only know the vicinity you’re in, with a radius of about one mile. Of couse, in some cases apps will simply not work or not work well if you only enable “approximate location data.” An example of this is “Find my device.” Needless to say, knowing an area with a one-mile radius where your phone could be won’t do you too much good. The same goes for Google Maps: the reason for using it is generally that you want to know exactly where you are and the exact way you have to take to get to your destination.
Other Android 12 privacy and security features
Phishing detection in Google Messages: To protect user data, Android 12 gives users a warning alongside suspicious messages, especially if these contain suspicious links. To make this feature as effective as possible, Google uses machine learning. Users can also give feedback to further improve the system. Do note that phising detection is only available for Google Pixel devices. Limiting motion data sharing: Two important components of your phone that are often overlooked are its gyroscope and its accelerator. These two sensors are vital to determine the orientation of your phone and as such change and maintain the correct screen orientation (horizontal or portrait). Your accelerator is also important for interpreting motion commands. Variable data processing: In Android 12 the data these sensors gather is refreshed at a limited rate, to limit the data your device is sharing about you, and as such safeguard your privacy. Some apps may require a faster data processing rate from these sensors. You can give these apps a special permission too. App hibernation: In Android 12, apps you haven’t used for some months lose their permissions to access (sensitive) data on your phone. Likewise, all the information stored in the app’s cache is also lost. In order for the app to get its permissions to access data, sensors and hardware back, you need to give it permission again. This feature prevents apps you used long ago, that you’ve forgotten about, from infringing on your privacy unnoticed and sending you push notifications. Clipboard access notifications: Android 12 will warn you if an app uses clipboard data from other apps. This warning only appears the first time.
Your Privacy Is Important
Whether you are concerned about safeguarding your private information on your Android device, or you are giving a device to your child, checking the privacy settings is a good way to ensure your information remains private. These simple measures will help you maintain the level of privacy that is right for you. If you want even more privacy and security, check out our list of the top 5 most secure smartphones designed with privacy in mind. Do you want to learn more about the security of Android smartphones, and how they compare to Android. Check out our iPhone vs Android security comparison.
If you want to stop ad profiling, you have to go to “Google” within your settings menu and then to “Ads”. If you want to manage your app permissions, you’ll instead go to “Applications”.
Then there are also some differences specific to your device. To get more detailed information on all of these privacy settings, consult this article.
Uninstalling unused apps Managing your app permissions Turning off locked screen notifications Managing your geo-tracking settings Using a VPN
