Counter-surveillance · TSCM
How to check your own vehicle, what a GPS tracker actually looks like, what the law says about someone placing one on you, and when it's worth having it swept properly.
Short answer No. Placing a tracking device on a vehicle belonging to another person without their consent is unlawful in Spain, and it applies within a marriage as much as outside it. Whose name is on the mortgage does not change the answer.
This surprises people who assume a shared life implies shared consent. It does not. Covertly monitoring another adult's movements interferes with their privacy regardless of the relationship, and where it forms part of a pattern of control it can engage more serious provisions still.
There is a second consequence that matters practically: material obtained this way is not merely unusable in proceedings, it turns the case around. Someone who tracks a spouse to prove infidelity arrives at the hearing with the conversation now about their own conduct.
If you suspect a device has been placed on your vehicle, you are the person whose rights have been interfered with — and that gives you a clear basis to have it checked. What an investigator can legally do in Spain
Short answer Most covert vehicle trackers are small black plastic boxes, roughly the size of a phone or a cigarette packet, often with a magnetic backing so they attach to metal in seconds. Some are wired into the vehicle's electrics instead and are considerably harder to spot.
Broadly there are three types. Magnetic battery units, placed in seconds and removed just as fast, which need retrieving periodically to recharge — so they tend to be positioned where someone can reach them without being seen. Hardwired units, spliced into the vehicle's power, which run indefinitely and require access to the interior or the engine bay. And OBD plug-in units, which sit in the diagnostic port under the dashboard and look, to anyone not expecting them, like part of the car.
The battery ones are what an amateur uses. The wired and OBD ones suggest either professional placement or extended access to the vehicle.
Short answer Work systematically through the places a device can be attached quickly and unseen: the wheel arches, under the bumpers, the underside of the chassis, the boot recesses, and the OBD port under the dashboard. Use a torch and a mirror, and take your time.
Signs worth noticing along the way: a wire that has been cut and rejoined, fresh tape or adhesive residue, a fuse box that looks disturbed, or a small aerial where there should not be one.
Short answer Do not remove it immediately. Photograph it exactly where it is, in position, before anything is touched — then take advice. A device pulled off and dropped in a drawer proves far less than one documented in place.
Found something, or checked and still not sure? A professional sweep uses detection equipment that finds what a torch cannot. The first conversation costs nothing.
Request a confidential callbackA visual search finds magnetic battery units, which is most of what amateurs use. What it does not reliably find is a hardwired device tucked behind a panel, or anything transmitting only intermittently.
A technical sweep — TSCM, for technical surveillance counter-measures — uses radio-frequency detection and physical inspection to identify transmitting devices and wiring that does not belong. It covers the vehicle properly rather than the places you can reach.
It is worth doing when you have already found one device, when the vehicle has been out of your control for a period, when you are in proceedings against someone with the means to arrange it, or when the pattern of what the other person knows cannot be explained any other way.
And a sweep answers the question either way. Being told, on the record, that nothing was found is worth something too — particularly to someone who has been doubting their own judgement about it.
People also ask
Do tracker detector apps work?
Not for this. Phone apps detect Bluetooth tags of the kind used for luggage, which is a different problem. A GPS vehicle tracker transmits over the mobile network and will not appear.
Can my employer track a company car?
Within limits, and only with proper notification. Spanish employment and data protection rules require that workers be informed, that the purpose be legitimate, and that monitoring be proportionate. Covert tracking without notification is a different matter entirely.
My car is in both our names. Does that make it legal?
Joint ownership of the vehicle does not create consent to monitor the other person. The interference is with their privacy, not with the car.
Could my own car have factory tracking?
Yes, and it causes a lot of false alarms. Modern vehicles have connected services, emergency call systems and manufacturer telematics as standard, and some finance and insurance agreements include tracking. Check what your vehicle came with before assuming the worst.
Can you tell me who placed it?
Sometimes. Devices carry identifiers and are bought and registered somewhere, so it is not always anonymous — but we will not promise it in advance. What a sweep reliably establishes is whether a device exists and where.
The service
Technical sweeps of vehicles, homes and premises by a licensed detective, with a signed report of what was found — or of what was not. Cases start from €1,200 plus VAT, quoted per case.
General information for an English-speaking reader, not legal advice. If you believe you are being monitored by someone who has threatened or controlled you, 016 is the domestic violence helpline in Spain and 112 is the emergency number.