Stalkerware Detection Test 2025: Security Products and the Fight Against Tech-Enabled Abuse
As part of our ongoing mission to evaluate digital threats and ensure user safety, AV‑Comparatives has published the results of its Stalkerware Detection Test 2025. This annual report highlights the ability of leading cybersecurity solutions to detect stalkerware — a category of surveillance software often misused for coercive control, harassment, or invasion of privacy.
What is Stalkerware?
Stalkerware refers to software that enables a third party to monitor a user’s activities without their consent. Installed secretly on a victim’s device — often a smartphone — these applications can track location, read messages, log keystrokes, or even record audio and video. While some of these tools are marketed as legal parental or employee monitoring solutions, their covert deployment and use in abusive relationships raise significant ethical and legal concerns.
Overview of the 2025 Test
This report is a collaborative effort between AV-Comparatives and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). EFF is a non-profit organisation that defends civil liberties such as privacy and free speech in the digital world through legal action, policy analysis, and activism. Together with cybersecurity companies, digital rights organisations, and survivor-support groups, EFF was one of the founding members of the Coalition Against Stalkerware (CAS) in November 2019 to address the growing misuse of such tools in domestic violence and abuse. The coalition’s objectives include defining best practices, raising awareness, providing training, strengthening the technical capacity of support organisations, and improving the cybersecurity industry’s response through sample sharing and consensus-based detection criteria.
For this test 13 popular security products for Android were tested to see how effectively they detected current stalkerware apps. The following security products where tested: Avast Mobile Security, Avira Antivirus Security, Bitdefender Mobile Security, ESET Mobile Security, F-Secure Total Security, G DATA Mobile Security, Google Play Protect, Kaspersky Mobile Security, Malwarebytes Mobile Security, McAfee Mobile Security, Norton 360 Mobile Security, Sophos Intercept X for Mobile and Trend Micro Mobile Security.
The test environment focused on well‑known and actively used stalkerware products, and scoring was based not only on detection capabilities but also on how clearly products label these apps (e.g., “monitoring software” vs. “malicious app”).
A Changing Landscape
“One trend that became clear to us as we reviewed the stalkerware landscape for our report is that there has been a lot of consolidation in recent years. The number of stalkerware vendors has noticeably decreased and the number of unique products is even lower, since several popular products are the same white‑label software that is being sold by different vendors.
Two factors that may be driving this trend are
1) US regulatory action against stalkerware vendors has made the market less appealing
2) abusers have switched to cheap, easily‑concealed Bluetooth‑enabled trackers for location tracking.A smaller number of unique products should be good news for the AV industry, as it makes higher levels of detection across the board easier to achieve and maintain. We hope that this report will renew interest at AV companies in prioritising the detection and labelling of stalkerware by their products.”
– Eva Galperin, Director of Cybersecurity, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)
This trend underscores the need for sustained industry vigilance, especially as attackers shift tactics or adopt alternative surveillance technologies.
Raising Awareness and Driving Change
AV‑Comparatives continues to advocate for:
- Responsible labeling of stalkerware by security vendors;
- Continued cooperation with digital‑rights organisations such as the EFF;
- Industry‑wide commitment to protecting vulnerable individuals from digital abuse.
We encourage vendors to review their detection strategies and labelling practices. Detecting stalkerware isn’t just a technical benchmark — it’s a statement of principle about whose safety matters in the digital ecosystem.
Download the Report
The full Stalkerware Detection Test 2025 report, including product results and methodology, is available at:
Stalkerware Test 2025 – AV‑Comparatives
You can also read EFF’s own blog post here: EFF Teams Up With AV Comparatives to Test Android Stalkerware Detection by Major Antivirus Apps | Electronic Frontier Foundation
