'Boyfriend Tracker' Apps–for the Paranoid Creep Who Has Everything!

A controversial new relationship app has línguas wagging all over Brazil: the “Boyfriend Tracker” has been removed from Google Play after public outcry over invasion of privacy. The app is designed for suspicious creeps who want to track their marauding boyfriends’ penis movements (presumably it works equally well on the phone of any gender, but obv it’s those horny man-dogs who need watching the most). The goal is to save their precious relationships, or something, I guess, because love. Because there’s nothing healthier than violent, invasive jealousy between consenting adults!

It works like this: First you steal your boyfriend’s phone while he’s in the shower or doinking off his hot dog or cheering the sports game or whatever it is men do. Then you install an extremely inconspicuous app called “BOYFRIEND TRACKER” on his phone, which costs $2/month, but I’m sure he won’t notice the charges unless you’re dating the kind of nerd who actually reads his bills (and why would you need to track a nerd!?!?). Then you set Boyfriend Tracker to “track boyfriend,” slip it back into boyfriend’s pants, and track away! Using GPS, Boyfriend Tracker records all of the places that boyfriend goes—such as the skank kiosk at the Southside Humpplex, or Dong Aerobics at 24-Hour Titness, or round the back gate of Old Mrs. Gonçalves, the shambling widow (that hussy!). Finally, you steal his phone again, and you look at it, and Boyfriend Tracker informs you that your boyfriend drove to Pussy Village yesterday at 4:37 pm, averaging 121 km/h, and you’re like, “You’re busted, sweetie! And so are you, Paul! Also, nice gas mileage!” Then you and Boyfriend Tracker french. NEEDLESS TO SAY, YOU’VE HAD THE LAST LAUGH.

Final step: tru luv.

It is a foolproof plan.

Anyhooz, the boyfriends (and responsible, self-respecting, boundary-having human beings of all genders) of Brazil are not pumped, and successfully campaigned to have the app pulled.

…[W]hen it comes to the cloak and dagger effort of catching philandering lovers, all high-tech weapons appear to be fair game — at least to the tens of thousands of Brazilians who downloaded “Boyfriend Tracker” to their smartphones before the stealthy software was removed from the Google Play app store last week, apparently in response to complaints about privacy abuses and its potential to be used for extortion or even stalking.

“Brazilians are a jealous people, what can I say? Of course it’s going to be popular,” said Marcia Almeida, a 47-year-old woman in Rio whose marriage ended seven years ago in large part because of what she said was her husband’s infidelity.

“It’s a different type of spying,” she said of comparisons to the NSA surveillance program. “You’re checking up on somebody you know intimately, not some stranger.”

Oh, well okay, then. Instead of “checking up” on “some stranger,” it’s totally better to invade the privacy of someone you know and love, who trusts you implicitly and loves you unconditionally! According to Fox News’s report on “Boyfriend Tracker”:

Similar apps are marketed for smartphone users in other countries, including Europe and the U.S.

First of all, LOL EUROPE IS NOT A COUNTRY WAY TO GO #HURHURFOXNEWSJOKE. And second of all, wait, what? Someone could be boyfriend-tracking me right now? I headed over to the App Store to find out. (I asked my boyfriend if he minded if I tracked him—for the purposes of journalism—and he said, “Sure, if you want. Any time I’m not with you I’m literally always in a bar surrounded by women.” He’s a musician. I GUESS WE SHOULD BREAK UP.)

There are a whole bunch of Boyfriend Tracker-esque apps that claim to let you “spy” on your partner via their phone, but pretty much all of them are hilarious garbage. The only ones that even kind of work are exactly like Brazil’s Boyfriend Tracker—where you have to steal your partner’s phone, install a lime-green app that says “CHEATER TRAPPER” in huge letters, and then steal their phone again to check up on where they went. What could possibly go wrong? One app, which I dropped a cool $.99 for, sends you “hidden camera” photographs of what your partner is doing. (My boyfriend, apparently, turned into a white guy and is currently getting body-slammed by Christi from Dance Moms! Right now! JUST LIKE I SUSPECTED.) The rest are either pranks or spam.

One thing all these apps have in common is a bunch of enraged one-star reviews from frantic customers, absolutely furious that they weren’t able to stroke their obsessive paranoia by invading their partners’ privacy. Just a thought: If you’re one of those people, I’d wager you have bigger problems in your life than some obviously garbage app being a rip-off.

Since this seems like a burgeoning market, and I am nothing if not a venture capitalist (full disclosure: I do not actually know what that means), I’ve come up with my own foolproof app to detect whether or not your supposedly monogamous partner is cheating.

Step 1: Send me $5. In an envelope to the Jezebel office is fine. (Note: The more money you send, the better the app will work!)

Step 2: Ask yourself, “Does it seem like my partner is cheating?”

Step 3: If the answer is, “Yes,” go ahead and ask your partner, “Hey, are you cheating?”

Step 4: If your partner says, “Yes,” or is an evasive weirdo about it, your partner might be cheating. If you partner says, “Yes,” in a sarcastic voice, or is an evasive weirdo about it because you ask this same fucking question every time your partner leaves your sight to take a dump, you might be a paranoid monster with trust issues.

Step 5: MARITAL BLISS.

In conclusion, human beings, we really, really, really need to get over this shit. Spending all of your time obsessing over your partner’s movements, assuming the worst about them every time they leave the house, and flying into jealous rages if they speak to any people who are not you, is not a mentally healthy (or fun) way to exist. Being let down by someone you trust is much less damaging than being so incapable of trust that you feel compelled to possess and control other human beings. Treating people you supposedly love like prisoners is a great way to drive them right out of your life. “Boyfriend Tracker” apps are more of a self-fulfilling prophecy than a self-help tool.