Early in 2025, before the official rollout of Android 16, early beta builds highlighted what would soon be known as ‘Advanced Protection.’
Essentially a new setting that encompasses all existing security and privacy tools (at the time), and new ones, the mode makes it easy for users to find all device protection-related settings under one roof.
When first made available, Advanced Protection featured the likes of Theft Detection, Offline Device Lock, Unknown App Protection, and more, with other known features, like Intrusion Detection, said to be released in the future.
Android 16 hit stable all the way back in June 2025, and we still don’t have Intrusion Detection available to us in January 2026. That, however, could change very soon.
For those unaware, Intrustion Detection is an after-the-fact feature that doesn’t necessarily do anything to protect your device, but it can help you after your device has been breached. It lets users revisit encrypted logs of device activity (like USB events, browsing history, app installs) for post-breach analysis.
The wait for the feature may soon be over, thanks to the folks over at Android Authority spotting signs of Intrusion Detection in version 26.02.31 of Google Play Services.
(It’s worth noting that the feature was manually enabled, and the aforementioned Play Services build will not activate Intrusion Detection for you).
As seen in the screenshots above, Intrusion Logging will appear right at the bottom of the Advanced Protection menu in a new ‘Other features’ section. “Preserves encrypted logs of some device activity in case of a security issue,” reads the feature’s description.
Also worth noting is that your device will suggest you enable Intrusion Logging when setting up device protection, though it won’t be a compulsion.
The same setting panels reiterate some of the information we already know, including the fact that logs will be end-to-end encrypted, and that Google won’t be able to access the logs. They also reiterate the types of activities recorded, including device connections, app installs, when your screen was unlocked, browsing history, and more.
Surprisingly, the settings screen does offer one extra piece of information that we did not know earlier. “Logs are automatically deleted after 12 months and for your protection, can’t be deleted manually.”
Intrusion Detection is expected to land with the stable version of Android 16 QPR3, which should roll out in March 2026.
