Main points
- The iPhone’s Diary app feature does not broadcast full names or exact locations, contrary to claims on social media.
- The “Discoverable by Others” setting enhances prompts, but can be turned off manually in Privacy settings.
- Apple’s new Diary app, while basic, doesn’t have privacy concerns around data sharing.
Over the past month or so, I’ve been seeing various posts on social networks, each claiming that the iPhone’s Diary app (which first launched with the release of iOS 17.2) is broadcasting your full name and exact location. I’ve seen headlines on TikTok videos claiming it’s a privacy nightmare for women and that all iPhone users should turn off the feature immediately. Is the iPhone’s “Discoverable by Others” setting really as bad as people say?
In short: No, it’s not, but I understand why people would be concerned.
Below I’ll walk you through what this feature does and what it actually does, as well as steps you can take to turn it off to give you more peace of mind.
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Apple’s new Journaling app debuts in iOS 17.2. I’ve been using it for a few weeks and it’s very basic. But that’s not a bad thing here.
What is “Discoverable by Others” on iPhone?
Journal app uses it to provide better writing prompts
When Apple released iOS 17.2, the iPhone software update included the new Journal app. The app is designed as a simple app that you can use to record your thoughts on a regular basis. To encourage users to create new entries regularly, Apple has developed a new suggestions API that uses various metrics such as your location, music or podcasts you have recently listened to, or photos you have taken to create new entries in the Journal app hint.
Because of the way the API is structured, any information contained in a suggestion is actually invisible to the journaling application until you decide to create an entry based on the suggestion. Third-party diary apps can use the same API and won’t see any of the information included in the suggestions until you intentionally take action.
Part of that suggestion mechanism is that your iPhone will periodically check your location, and in this particular case, use Bluetooth to check for nearby devices and see if any of them belong to one whose information is in your Contacts app someone. The diary app will then notice that you are in the same location as the person in your contact list, but not with you.
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Does the Journal app share your information?
Long story short: no
Let’s say you go to a concert with a few friends, and you have a contact card in the People app for everyone in the group.
At some point during the concert, your iPhone will record your friends near the concert venue but will not identify them. The next morning, or maybe later that week, if you were to open the Journal app, you might see a suggestion using the concert venue location as a prompt. It knows that you were there and that other people were there (however, it won’t say who those people were), so it might suggest that event as something worth writing about.
Your iPhone (and iPhones around you) knows when you’re with or around someone you know, but not who that person is, and then it uses that information to provide better suggestions for writing prompts in the Journal app. suggestion.
More succinctly: Your iPhone (and iPhones around you) knows when you’re with or around someone you know, but not who that person is, and then it uses that information to write prompts in the Journal app Provide better advice. It doesn’t broadcast or share your full name or exact location, nor does it do that for your contacts like many social media posts would have you believe.
Apple has a privacy page that details the Journal app’s suggested features and each setting. You can read the full article here.
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How to turn off Discoverable by Others
Turn it off in iPhone Settings
If you’re still uncomfortable with how the feature works, just turn it off with a few taps on your iPhone screen.
- Open settings Apps on iPhone.
- go Privacy and security > Journaling Advice.
- Toggle the switch next to can be discovered by others arrive leave Location.
Doing so also turns off the “Preferred Suggestions with Others” setting, which means you will no longer receive any suggestions based on when your iPhone detects you’re near someone you know. While you’re on this screen, take a few extra seconds to browse the rest of the Diary app’s suggested settings and make sure you only get the suggestions you need.