Third-Party Service Categories in Android Mobile Gaming Apps: A Static Empirical Analysis

Mobile gaming applications (apps) commonly incorporate third-party technologies associated with advertising, analytics, attribution, and social/engagement functions. Despite substantial research on mobile privacy, tracking, and third-party Software Development Kits (SDKs), comparatively limited attention has been directed toward the composition and co-occurrence of selected third-party service categories within mobile gaming apps. This study presents a static empirical analysis of selected third-party service categories within 41 Android mobile gaming apps, comprising 20 children-oriented and 21 general-audience games. The analysis focused on four predefined categories: advertising, analytics, attribution, and social/engagement. Third-Party Service Category Breadth (TSCB) was used to characterize the number of these selected categories detected within each app, while recurring configurations were identified through category co-occurrence analysis. Advertising was detected in 70.7% of the analyzed apps, followed by Social/Engagement (61.0%), Analytics (26.8%), and Attribution (17.1%). No statistically significant evidence of a difference in overall category breadth was observed between children-oriented and general-audience apps (U = 175, p = 0.347). However, Social/Engagement-related evidence was detected more frequently in general-audience apps (85.7%) than in children-oriented apps (35.0%), and this association remained statistically significant after correction for multiple comparisons (Holm-adjusted p = 0.005). The between-group difference also remained statistically significant under a conservative sensitivity analysis using a stricter Social/Engagement classification (Fisher’s exact p = 0.015). The most frequently observed configuration was Advertising + Social/Engagement, detected in 13 apps (31.7%). These findings characterize the static presence, breadth, and co-occurrence of selected third-party service categories within the analyzed Android gaming apps and should not be interpreted as evidence of runtime activation, data exchange, or direct revenue contribution.