# Third Party Tracking in the Mobile Ecosystem

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1804.03603 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/1804.03603/

## Key facts

- Cited by 5 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 10 Apr 2018.

## Built on by (most cited first, 5 of 5)

- [GreaseVision: Rewriting the Rules of the Interface](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.03731/) (2022)
- [Entailment-Driven Privacy Policy Classification with LLMs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.16621/) (2024)
- [Word-level Annotation of GDPR Transparency Compliance in Privacy Policies using Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.10727/) (2025)
- [ROI: A method for identifying organizations receiving personal data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.09495/) (2022)
- [Enabling Multilingual Privacy Policy Audits: Large-Scale Analysis of Spanish Mobile Apps](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.18424/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Third party tracking allows companies to identify users and track their behaviour across multiple digital services. This paper presents an empirical study of the prevalence of third-party trackers on 959,000 apps from the US and UK Google Play stores. We find that most apps contain third party tracking, and the distribution of trackers is long-tailed with several highly dominant trackers accounting for a large portion of the coverage. The extent of tracking also differs between categories of apps; in particular, news apps and apps targeted at children appear to be amongst the worst in terms of the number of third party trackers associated with them. Third party tracking is also revealed to be a highly trans-national phenomenon, with many trackers operating in jurisdictions outside the EU. Based on these findings, we draw out some significant legal compliance challenges facing the tracking industry.