iPhone Safety Check: review who can see your information

Over time, a phone builds up a web of sharing. A partner sees your location. A shared album with family keeps growing. An old laptop is still signed in to your account. An app you tried once still has access to your photos. None of it was a mistake when you set it up, but it adds up, and after a breakup, a falling-out or simply a few years, it’s hard to remember what’s still on.

Safety Check gathers that web into one place on iPhone. It was designed with people leaving abusive relationships in mind, and it’s useful for anyone who wants a clear look at who can see what.

What you need

• An iPhone with iOS 16 or later.
• To be signed in to your account on the iPhone.
• Two-factor authentication turned on for that account.

If your iPhone is managed by an employer or school, or has Screen Time restrictions, some options may not be available.

Before you start: think about safety

If someone might react badly to losing access to your information, plan before you change anything. People aren’t sent a message when you stop sharing, but they may notice that your location or a shared album has disappeared. An advocate can help you decide what to change and when. If you might want to keep evidence, take screenshots of what’s being shared first.

Every Safety Check screen has a Quick Exit button in the top-right corner. It closes Settings and returns to the Home Screen immediately, keeping any changes you’ve already made.

How to open it

Go to Settings, then Privacy & Security, then scroll down and tap Safety Check.

You’ll be offered two paths.

Manage Sharing & Access

The step-by-step review. You can look at:

• People: who you share with, and what. Choose a person to see everything they have access to, such as your location, shared photos and albums, notes or calendars, and stop sharing what you choose.
• Information: the same, organized by type of information instead of by person.
• Apps: which apps have permission to use your location, photos, camera, microphone and more, and reset those permissions.
• Devices: every device signed in to your account. Remove any you don’t recognize or no longer use.
• Account security: change your iPhone passcode and your account password, and review the phone numbers that can receive your sign-in codes.

Emergency Reset

The fast option. It stops sharing with all people and apps at once, lets you review your emergency contacts, and helps you remove other devices from your account and change your passcode and password. Use it if you need everything off now and can sort out the details later.

What Safety Check can’t reach

Its reach is the iPhone and your account. It can’t review or change:

• other companies’ apps and accounts, such as messaging, social media, email or cloud storage from other providers;
• passwords you’ve shared with someone, or accounts they can sign in to;
• devices signed in to a different account, such as a shared family tablet;
• photos already downloaded or saved by someone else.

For other accounts, check their own device lists and sign out sessions you don’t recognize. See checking which devices are signed in to your account. For shared albums specifically, see who can see your shared albums.

After you’ve run it

• Change your passcode if someone else knew it, and don’t reuse an old one.
• Check location sharing in other apps, such as maps, messaging and family-tracking apps.
• Look for apps you don’t recognize and remove them.
• Run it again after any big change, and every few months.

If you think someone has more access than sharing settings can explain, for example they seem to know what you’ve texted, see signs someone went through your phone.

Private photos that don’t depend on sharing settings

Shared albums, synced libraries and signed-in devices are all ways your photos can reach other people. Photos kept inside a vault aren’t part of any of them. Silo, coming soon to iPhone and Android, has no account and nothing to share, so there’s no list of people or devices to review.