There’s no shortage of things we share with a very close friend – our deepest secrets, our quality time, our possessions and ideas. But for a certain cohort, that sense of closeness is now fortified through a habit that, just over a decade ago, was practically unheard of: the habitual sharing – and tracking – of your friends’ location.
It’s now common for parents to track their children so they know where they are – Zara Tindall’s daughter was recently photographed wearing an Apple AirTag. But a straw poll reveals location tracking among friends, for pure sport, has become normalised too.
We’re not talking pre-arranged agreements to check in at a friend’s request here. Thirteen years since Apple’s rollout of Find My Friends, and seven since Google’s launch of location sharing, safety is more of a secondary feature than anything else.
This is pure, unadulterated snooping. While many still primarily use these features to let their friends know they got home OK after a night out, it appears that tracking your friends throughout the day is the norm – and even a sign of affection.
Sarah Bodenham, 32, from London, says she uses Find My Friends to see where her friends are throughout the day, checking it as often as she does Instagram or Tik Tok: “Seeing people’s locations is a way for me to feel close to them. In a way, it means that we have a close relationship. Having that connection to each other is a nice feature of our friendship.
“I think it’s quite fun, like a little private social media app.”
While Rachel Newbury, 34, from Birmingham, who also uses Find My friends says: “I like it. I feel looked after. I don’t feel like I have anything to hide.”
She initially took to location tracking because of her anxiety around her friends’ safety – but says the rules are different when it comes to tracking a romantic partner. “For partners, it feels a bit too much – I think there needs to be a degree of separation.”
Ella, 31, from London, is another location-tracking advocate who sees nothing wrong with sleuthing around location-sharing apps – or being tracked herself – and says it feels like a little “game”.
“I’m an open book. I’m never anywhere that I’m not proud of being in. What secrets do I have? And those people who are being guarded – you definitely have secrets.”
In fact, she’s embedded the practice so firmly into her daily life that she checks the app “hourly” and has a widget for her sister’s location on the home screen of her phone.
Social media companies have certainly leaned into the gamification of poking around in friends’ business. Snapchat launched its Snap Map, in which users can look at avatars (or Bitmojis) representing animated versions of their contacts and their whereabouts, in 2017.
Instagram, meanwhile, rolled out a Friend Map in August this year for select users. Apple AirTags, launched in 2021, have also become a means of keeping tabs – although they tend to be used to track items (and, increasingly, the whereabouts of children), rather than friends.
Research looking at the number of people who happily share their locations with romantic partners, for example, shows that 44 per cent of us are happy to use location sharing with their companions, increasing to 78 per cent among 18-24-year-olds in particular.
But not everyone is comfortable with the trend for tracking your friends’ every move.
One friend who initially shared her location with friends for safety purposes, didn’t feel great when a nosey friend got carried away.
She said: “Years ago, when we all lived in different ends of London, one of my friends suggested to our core friendship group to have each other on “Find My Friends” so we could make sure everyone got home safe at night after the pub and various nights out. It made sense especially as I’m prone to crawling straight into bed and forgetting to message everyone.
“I forgot about it until last week when my friend – who is now my flatmate – revealed that often she checks my location when I’m not home in the evening as she’s curious as to what I’m up to. It’s a bit creepy and made me feel uncomfortable, like I am being monitored.”
Despite being a fan of checking up on her friends herself, Rachel – who has all of her close friends as contacts on the Find My Friends app – also told me she suspected one had been using it to keep tabs on her. The only problem is, removing her could cause issues.
She said: “I have one friend in particular who I don’t want on there. She’s the type to turn up at my house because I’m at home. I feel like I’m being watched a bit too much and I don’t like it.”
During one of her customary snooping sessions, Catherine, from London, told me she discovered her friend’s partner was being unfaithful when she noticed he had taken several trips outside of the capital to a remote rural location.
“I texted him asking why and he said ‘don’t tell her’.” She decided to keep the information to herself because of the complicated situation. He has since turned his location off.
Discoveries of creeping off to meet what some refer to as “sneaky links” (a casual sexual partner that you don’t want anyone to know you’re seeing) appear to be quite common too.
Rachel has also stumbled on friends’ clandestine affairs. “I caught a friend once. Her brother and mum were worried about where she was and I screenshotted her location. It turns out she was actually with a guy. I accidentally sent her sneaky link’s address to her brother, which she forgave me for because it was genuinely innocent.”
It appears that sooner rather than later, more of us will have to get on board with the prospect of being open about our whereabouts – or at least refrain from judging those who do see it as a perfectly acceptable daily routine.
