Google Latitude gives you control over how much or how little location info you want to share with whomever you choose. Before someone can view your location, you must either send the person a location request by adding them as a friend or accept their location request and choose to share back your location.
Turn on location reporting
Location reporting needs to be turned on. You can turn location reporting on through Google Maps by going to the menu and choosing Settings > Location settings > Location reporting. Make sure that “Detect your location” is selected. If there is a “Report from this device” option available, you should select this option as well. Note that these settings may be located in a different place for older versions of Google Maps.
Change Latitude privacy settings
Use the Latitude settings menu at any time to change settings for all friends:
- Report from this device. Report your location in the background from this device. Use this checkbox if you have multiple devices to control which one will be used to update your location
- Detect your location. Your location is updated automatically. Learn more about sharing your location.
- Set your location. Manually select a location on the map that will be shared with friends.
- Hide your location/Do not update your location. No friends can see your location. Your friends will not see your photo icon on a map and will not see a location for you in their list view.
- Do not update location. Your location will not be updated. If this option is selected you can not use Latitude.
- Enable location sharing. If unchecked, you can't see your friends and they can't see you. Your friends will not see your photo icon on a map and will not see a location for you in their list view.
- Manage your friends. Add or remove friends who can see your location. (This does not affect all friends.)
- Sign out of Latitude (mobile only). You can't see your friends and they can't see you. Your friends will not see your photo icon on a map and will not see a location for you in their list view.
Select an individual friend from the map or list view to see more info and options. For specific friends, you can hide your location, share only city level location, or remove the friend from Latitude.
When your location is updated
Once you've turned on automatic location detection, Latitude will continue to update and share your location with whom you've chosen while your phone is on. If you turn your phone off and on again, Latitude will respect your previous choice and will continue to update your location in the background. To stop background location updating, open Maps for mobile and change your privacy settings.
The background location update frequency isn't a fixed amount of time. The update frequency is determined by several factors, such as how much battery life your phone has, if you are moving, or how fast you are moving. Background updating will only use cell ID or WiFi location detection depending on your device. GPS will not be used in the background to preserve battery life.