Have you ever taken the time to look deep into the layers of your mobile phone’s privacy settings? Sticking with the default settings that prompted you step by step when you first set up your phone may have seemed like you covered all the bases. However, you really didn’t get to the nitty gritty part where you find out that your phone is tracking your every location and how many times you visited there. Shame on you phone, that’s kind of personal!

Ask yourself these questions, and if the answer is “I don’t know,” it may be time to get to know your phone’s privacy settings and customize them to your liking.

1. Do you know which apps are using your location services?
2. Do you know what ad tracking is?
3. Is Safari tracking your web use and storing personal information?

You would be surprised at how many different settings there are that you would never think to check. You may also be surprised at how many ways your phone is tracking your location, collecting data, and making your personal information vulnerable to security breaches.

Here are a few articles that will help you decipher the Privacy Setting on your iPhone and Android:

This Article shows where all the setting are located and what they do on both the Android and iPhone. Smartphone Privacy Settings Need To be Activated Today

This article includes a step by step slide show of how to set up and change the security and privacy settings on the iPhone with iOS 9. iPhone iOS 9 Privacy Security Settings

While this article is for iOS 8 on the iPhone, the privacy settings are relatively the same. There are step by step instructions with images. Top 10 iOS 8 Privacy Settings