How to Detect Spyware on Android (Stalkerware Scan)

Open Google Play, search for Malwarebytes, and install Malwarebytes Mobile Security. Check the developer underneath the title reads Malwarebytes before you tap Install — copycat security apps are common, and a scanner installed from a link someone sent you is worthless. Once it finishes installing, tap Open.

The app opens on a short intro — tap Get started. It then offers its paid plans, Plus and Standard.

Close that screen with the × in the top-left. You can detect spyware with Malwarebytes entirely for free — the scan on the dashboard you land on is the full detection scan, and it costs nothing.

Tap Scan now and Malwarebytes will ask for two things before it can look properly. Both are reasonable for a scanner, and both are worth granting.

First, File storage access. Tap Give permission, then Allow (in Settings) on the system dialog, switch on Allow access to manage all files, and press back. Then it asks to run in the background — tap Give permission, then Allow.

The scan starts the moment you grant those permissions — you do not need to tap anything else. A green ring closes around whatever is being checked as it works through your apps first, then your files, with the counters climbing underneath.

Watch the threats detected figure at the top. It stays on zero for most of the run and only ticks up when something is actually flagged, as it does in the example above. Let the scan finish either way — on a phone with a few hundred apps it takes a minute or two.

When the scan finishes you get the tally and, if anything was flagged, a list of it. Look closely at the names. In the example above the two detections are called “Android System” and “System UI”, complete with tidy green system icons. Neither is the real Android component it is impersonating. That is precisely how this software survives on a phone: it wears the most boring, most official-looking name it can, because almost nobody questions an entry called Android System.

Tap the three dots beside an entry to see what it actually is. If the scan comes back No threats detected instead, that is the common result and it is good news — but a clean scan is not the whole answer, so read the notes below before you close the app.

Do not tap Remove yet. If this could ever become a legal matter, deleting the app destroys the proof it was there — and the person watching will notice their feed go dark. Screenshot the result first.