Force iOS location Services

[nnatale]

I am looking for a way to prevent location services from being turned off on our ipads and iphones. The app pops up letting the end user know that location services are on and allows the end use to disable.

[benspringael · Accepted solution]

Hi Nic

Don't think it's possible

Article: https://documentation.meraki.com/SM/Monitoring_and_Reporting/Managing_Systems_Manager_Location_Services_for_iOS

You cannot configure Privacy > Location Services via MDM. This means that end users have the ability to turn on or off GPS tracking.

Cheers,

Ben

[JoshH1]

We have got round this using restrictions on the device under settings > general > restrictions and then disallowing the change to location settings. - only downside is that it has to be configured on the device - we do it before rollout.

[nnatale]

Thanks

[vassallon]

I have asked Apple to add this functionality as I believe they will have to develop code to all MDM vendors to enforce this restriction. At this time there isn't even a way to develop a restriction through Apple Configurator 2 or any other restriction payload method.

[wharrison1]

We've found that disabling the supervised restriction "Allow modifying Find My Friends settings" greys out the Location Services switch so the end-user cannot change it.

[nnatale]

thanks!

[wharrison1]

Be aware though that the end-user can still go in and change the location access for each app.

But the overall location services switch is set to permanently on.

[MarkSchilling]

What if the device in question currently has location services turned off? Will locking the setting automatically turn location services on as well as permanently locking that option down, or will it leave the location services permanently off?

[wharrison1]

If I remember correctly, it allows the end user to turn it on, and only then greys out the switch so it cannot be turned off.

[aCancino]

I know this is an old post but I wanted to provide an update to this. As of today, it appears that disabling the supervised restriction "Allow modifying Find My Friends settings" no longer greys out the Location Services switch for devices running on 13.1.2.

iOS devices on 12.3.1, or older, will continue to have the Location Services switch greyed out. Hopefully another work-around can be found in the near future!

[vassallon]

@aCancino That makes sense as there are two new restrictions that control the Find My App.

Allow Find My Device in the Find My app.

Allow Find My Friends in the Find My app.

[wharrison1]

Well spotted.

So now we have to decide if it matters or not.

What scenarios can we imagine where we would want to access the location of an iOS device (via SM) without having to put the device into Lost Mode...?

[Melissa4]

Location services can be disabled by the user - this is an apple restriction/requirement for the time being.

The work arounds described in this thread are definitely an option!

Another feature to be aware of is Lost Mode (for supervised devices) - which will "wake" location services, even if the user has disabled them. It wont lock location services on once Lost mode is disabled, which sounds like what you're looking for. Thought I'd mention it anyway 🙂

https://documentation.meraki.com/SM/Monitoring_and_Reporting/Using_Lost_Mode_to_Recover_Missing_iOS_Devices