Apple is adding a broader set of child-safety controls to iOS 27, iPadOS 27 and macOS 27 later this fall, including tighter child account setup, web-browsing approvals, contact approvals and expanded warnings for explicit or violent imagery. For families, the changes mean more of the kid-locking machinery moves into Apple’s own operating systems instead of being left to third-party apps, carrier controls or parental patience.
The announcement landed during Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June. Sarah Gardner, founder and CEO of the child-safety nonprofit Heat Initiative, told WIRED that Apple spent about 10 minutes of its keynote on the subject, which she described as a major shift for a company she says long acted as if children’s online lives were someone else’s problem.
Gardner has repeatedly protested outside Apple Park in Cupertino, California, over what Heat Initiative says are weak protections for children across Apple products. She told WIRED the new tools are not groundbreaking, but called them a positive move. She also pointed to advocacy and litigation as pressure on Apple, including a West Virginia lawsuit alleging that Apple’s business practices protect child sexual abuse material, or CSAM.
Apple said it has a long-running commitment to providing a safe and trusted platform for children while protecting user privacy. That is the same tension that sank one of the company’s most controversial earlier plans: an iCloud photo-scanning system meant to detect CSAM. Apple abandoned that tool after criticism from privacy and security experts who warned it could become surveillance infrastructure. Apple later told Heat Initiative that it had concluded the system could not be implemented without endangering users’ privacy and security.
Gardner still wants Apple to deploy that detection technology, arguing it can balance safety and privacy. Anunay Kulshrestha, an applied cryptographer and information security consultant at Infosec Clinic, told WIRED he disagrees. He said Apple’s earlier CSAM proposal lacked accountability guarantees and warned that governments could pressure Apple to add non-CSAM material to the detection set.
What changes for families
Apple says child account setup has been rebuilt and should take about six minutes. The setup is required for children under 13 and available up to age 18. It includes limits on adult websites, age-appropriate media settings and App Store restrictions based on age. Parents can start a child’s device with a small group of essential apps, a curated selection or a manual list, then add more later.
A new Safari feature called Ask to Browse lets parents require approval before a child visits a new website. The request goes to the parent through Messages, similar to Apple’s existing Ask to Buy flow for App Store purchases and installations.
Apple is also making new contacts permissioned by default for children. A child must ask before saving or communicating with a new person in Phone, FaceTime or Messages, and a parent can approve or reject the request from their own device.
The company’s Communication Safety feature, already used to detect and blur nudity in Messages, FaceTime and AirDrop for users under 18, is expanding to include gore and graphic violence. Apple says the protection will also work in Shared Photo Albums, Contact Posters and Contacts.
App Store questions remain
Gardner’s June protest also targeted “nudify” apps, which use AI to make real people appear nude in edited images. The Tech Transparency Project reported finding 47 such apps in Apple’s and Google’s app stores in January. Apple told WIRED that nudification apps violate its guidelines and said it has rejected many and removed others, including apps reported through App Store tools.
Gardner also questioned why Apple has not removed Grok from the App Store after WIRED reported that it still hosted sexualized deepfakes of celebrities as recently as June. Apple did not address that specific question, according to WIRED.
Apple is adding a reporting tool for CSAM and other inappropriate material, first in Australia, Brazil, the United States and the United Kingdom, with more regions to follow. Screen Time is also getting age-based time allowance suggestions based on app categories, with Apple saying it used the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Family Media Plan as a reference point. Parents can customize those limits, schedule access by time of day or week and pause a child’s device from their own.
This story draws on original reporting from WIRED.
