iOS – How to Block an App from Accessing Contacts

contactsiosprivacy

An app that has access to the list of contacts is capable, without further notice, to upload that information to a server. (If it has internet access, that is, but most do.)

I am concerned of the breach of trust to my contacts that this entails.

For example, someone on my contacts list may have gone into some trouble to remain unlisted in any phone book, and yet their phone number could become near-public, depending on the privacy policy of the app, which I, like many, never bother to read.

I'm here not even referring to app(s) that exist with the sole and express intent of making contacts lists public.

Is there any way to be in control by choosing whether a given app has access to my contacts list, similar to how an app can have access to notifications, but I can disable its access to notifications while continuing to use the app?

To be clear, a messenger app becomes meaningless if it doesn't have access to contacts, but, for example, an app showing me the nearest grocer or coffee shop has no need to access my contacts. Please do not suggest "Just don't install an app that gratuitously asks for permission to access contacts." Doing so leaves users in the stone age. I'd like to be able to use any app, but to remain in charge.

Edit:

For comparison, here is a link to a companion question for Android.

Best Answer

Instructions for macOS & iOS...

For macOS
System Prefs > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Contacts
uncheck any you wish to have no access

for iOS

Settings > Privacy > Contacts

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IPhone – How did a photo magically appear in the iphone contacts

Your initial guess that it's Google Contacts is right - if you've set it up to sync with Google Contacts, it'll pull down the same contact photos as you have in Google Contacts, and it works both ways (assign a photo on iPhone, syncs back up to Google Contacts).

If you've got a contact photo set in Google+ or the like, it'll pull that photo automatically, so that's the photo which'll appear to others.

Show today’s anniversaries (if any) from contacts

Looking at the database being opened by that SQLite snippet in Navicat I don't see any data there; I would assume that the iCloud move caused some changes but perhaps I am not viewing it right.

If you have a developer account you might look in the documentation for Address Book programming. There's pretty rich support for searching and I would be shocked if you couldn't look for matching dates. Anniversaries seem to not have their own distinct type - there's a property constant for kABBirthdayProperty but nothing like Anniversary, so it presumably falls under kABOtherDatesProperty.

kABOtherDatesProperty
Dates associated with a person (ABMultiDateProperty containing dates).
Available in OS X v10.3 and later.
Declared in ABGlobals.h.

And sure enough, there's an identifier (seemingly the only pre-provided identifier) for other dates.

Other Dates Labels Labels for values contained in ABOtherDatesProperty multi-value properties.

kABAnniversaryLabe l
Constants
kABAnniversaryLabel
Anniversary date.
Available in OS X v10.3 and later.
Declared in ABGlobals.h.
Availability
Available in OS X v10.3 and later.

I imagine this sub-listing is why the command line app you reference doesn't spit out anniversaries; it would need to be cognizant of the possibility of other date types in that "other" category. But I would think it could be extended to handle them (if it still works?)

Given the above you might see if you can write a simple Swift app to spit out all entries with anniversaries. You can do command line apps with it. Applescript won't help you - the Contacts as interface doesn't seem to share out other type dates.

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