I have disabled all google apps on my device including google play services, can google still track me?
If you can still use the Google Play Store, than Google Play services are still running. If even then is gone, then you might be in the clear, but I would also be interested in how you did it. Normally what people do to escape Google Play services on Android is to use a custom ROM.
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I disabled google play store before I disabled the google play services so I can’t really tell by that, but I get notifications telling me samsung location services won’t work without google play services so I’m pretty confident it is disabled.
You can disable it by going into its app settings page and pressing disable in the bottom left. If you can’t find google play services in settings install the exodus app and search for google play services and press the settings icon and disable. I also can’t use a ROM because my phone isn’t supported on the vast majority of ROMs.
So for everyone who is interested, here is how it works (No root and no custom ROM).
STEP 1
In the settings, go to Security 〉Other Security Settings 〉Device Admin Apps 〉DISABLE “Find My Device” and any other app that is listed there. THIS IS NECESSARY FOR STEP 2
STEP 2
In the settings, go to Apps〉find “Google Play services” and tap on it 〉“Disable” in the bottom left corner
You will then immediately get spammed with notifications from all Google apps and one or two Samsung apps telling you they don’t work. They indeed do not and Google apps crash when they get launched. If these notifications bother you, you can long click them and silence them (individually for each app).
Note that this will break all apps that rely on Play Services (which is the goal of this, right?)
here’s my issue with disabling Google Play Services: If you lose your phone, you can’t use Find My Device to track the device’s location or remotely control it. Any suggested alternatives?
disclaimer:
Apps that rely on google play services will not work correctly. if you use mostly foss apps, ,this shouldn’t be an issue. but if you use something like Whatsapp, notifications and calls may get delayed. i remember on whatsapp i would receive a missed call notification 4 hours after the person actually called me ,if i disabled google play services.
Since you don’t use stock android, Samsung could still track you unless you disable all of their apps.
There is an awesome alternative for find my device. Just search for “FindMyDevice” (no spaces) on Fdroid (source code on Github by Nulide). Basically, you control it by first whitelisting some people (eg. family) which can then send and SMS to your phone in case you lost it to make it do all sorts of things (sending location, ringing, factory resetting, etc.)
Whatsapp works perfcetly if you disable “Battery Optimization” for it in the settings. Other apps might have issues with notifications…
Samsung could of course still track me, but the basic apps (like Calculator/Files) don’t do that (have a look at their privacy policy). There are some that do (which can easily be disabled via adb) but even if you dont do that, by simply disabling play services you are way more private because Google is the main problem there.
Keep in mind that even after disabling it the G services are installed as a privileged app.
Some Android ROMs like GprapheneOS allow installing them as a normal sandboxed app.