Over the last few years, Apple has released a number of features that parents can use for children that are aimed at reducing two categories of risk: use of apps parents disapprove of, activities parents want to discourage or limit, and spending money online; and exposure to unwanted contact, images, and videos, as well as preventing children from being able to make unfettered connections or send material to arbitrary people.
There have been bumps along the way. When Apple first introduced their more advanced child-safety features, they proposed invading people’s phones to look for potentially illegal material in a way that would treat a billion customers as if they might be criminals. They revised the approach, not without even more criticism.
On the parental-restriction front, Screen Time was Apple’s most direct foray into enabling guardians to shape children’s digital access. But Screen Time is janky—there’s no better word. It is sometimes hard to configure, it often fails, and kids can work around it even when they aren’t intending to.
With iOS 27 and iPadOS 27 (and extending to other platforms), Apple tries to offer substantive fixes and improvements to both aspects of child safety and adult supervision.
My children are, alas, both older than 18, and I’m unable to test these features directly.
Blur gore and violence
Apple has gingerly expanded features in this category. In this set of releases, Apple has pushed forward just a single change. The Communication Safety feature, which is enabled by default for children 13–17, already blurs any image or video that appears to contain nudity, whether the child is receiving it or attempting to send it, across a range of Apple’s communications apps, including Messages, AirDrop, and FaceTime video messages. The blurred image comes with a warning, offering guidance on seeking help. (For children under 13, they’re also prompted to start a conversation with a parent or guardian.)
In the 27 series of releases, images and video that a screening algorithm determines contain gore or violence also trigger the blur filter and warning.
