Few iPhone privacy concerns go deeper than access to your contacts list, which exposes your private web of relationships to a third party, who can then compare the list against their data or potentially share it with others. Here’s how to see which apps have access to your contacts, as well as grant or revoke access.
Open “Settings”
In ‘Settings’, tap ‘Privacy’.
In ‘Privacy’, tap ‘Contacts’.
Then you will see a list of every installed app that has requested access to your contacts in the past. Next to each you see a switch that is on or off. When the switch is set to “on”, the app can access your contacts. When set to “off”, the app cannot access your contacts at this time.
You can grant or revoke access to your contacts per app at any time by tapping the switch next to the app in this list.
Keep in mind that even if you give an app access to your contacts from this list, the app may not be automatically aware of this change in Settings. If so, you may be able to make an app revisit your contact list by forcing the app to restart. In some stubborn cases, removing and reinstalling the app can work.
If you revoke access from an app with this feature, the app will no longer be able to access your contacts the moment you flip the switch. But the app may have already uploaded your contact list to its servers, in which case that aspect of your privacy is still in the hands of the company running the app. If you need to remove access to your contacts there, you may be able to do so in the app itself, by contacting the company running the app, or by checking the account management settings on services like Facebook. Good luck!
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