Privacy is something that matters to almost everyone. You don’t want hackers, governments, or random third parties knowing exactly where you are at any moment. That’s the problem Apple is now addressing with a new iPhone and iPad security feature that limits how much location data mobile networks can collect.
In a recent blog post, Apple explained: "The limit precise location setting enhances your location privacy by reducing the precision of location data available to cellular networks. With this setting turned on, some information made available to cellular networks is limited. As a result, they might be able to determine only a less precise location — for example, the neighborhood where your device is located, rather than a more precise location (such as a street address). The setting doesn't impact signal quality or user experience."
The company was also quick to clarify a critical exception: "The limit precise location setting doesn't impact the precision of the location data that is shared with emergency responders during an emergency call."
This new feature can be viewed as Apple's response to a problem that has been growing for many years. Law enforcement agencies increasingly rely on mobile carriers to track people in real time or reconstruct where they have been. At the same time, hackers have made telecom networks a prime target. Over the past year alone, major US carriers like AT&T and Verizon disclosed intrusions tied to China-backed actors seeking sensitive call and messaging data. Long before that, flaws in global cellular infrastructure allowed surveillance vendors to monitor location data across borders.
However, the feature’s rollout is currently limited. It only works on newer devices that use Apple’s in-house modems — the iPhone Air, iPhone 16e, and cellular versions of the M5 iPad Pro, and it requires iOS or iPadOS 26.3. Carrier support is also narrow for now. In the US, Boost Mobile is the only launch partner, with a handful of carriers supported in Europe and Southeast Asia.
It's also worth noting that Apple is not the first mover here. Android has already had a similar location limit feature for a while, as reported by Android Authority. The capability was introduced with Android 15 and works using a new "Location Privacy HAL" to tell the cellular radio not to share GPS-level data with the carrier unless it’s for an emergency.
For now, only a small group of users will benefit. Over time, though, this feature signals where mobile privacy is heading: away from blanket trust in infrastructure providers and toward finer-grained user control.
Ogbonda Chivumnovu
