On Thursday, Apple announced a variety of new initiatives designed to allow parents and developers to use Apple devices to create safer experiences for children and teens. In addition to the ease of setting up a child's account, parents can share information about their child's age and accessed by app developers to provide age-appropriate content. The App Store will also introduce a new age rating set to help developers and App Store users gain a more detailed understanding of the app's aptitude for a particular age range.
The product pages for third-party apps in the App Store will also be updated to include additional information that will help guide parental decisions, such as whether the app has user-generated content and ads, and whether the app will provide its own parental control.
These updates will be rolled out to parents and developers later this year, Apple says.
The change comes amid ongoing legislative disputes at both the state and federal levels about how technology companies should protect their children online. Nine US states, including Utah and South Carolina, recently proposed invoices that require minors to check their child's age to an App Store operator, such as Apple, to obtain parental consent before downloading the app.
Apple has historically pushed third-party app developers to verify the age of their children, but large tech companies like Meta have lobbyed that they need to handle age verification as App Store operators already have this information about their users.
New solutions from iPhone makers are like compromises. Apple places you in a position to collect your child's age through parent input, but you will be responsible for third-party developers and extract and use this information to create age-appropriate experiences in your app.
Easy to set up child accounts
Image credit: Apple
Apple's system provides a simple process for setting up the child accounts required by children under the age of 13, and is optional for young people up to the age of 18.
Parents can now select the age range of their children when setting up a new child account. Parents can also confirm that they are adults in the home by checking their payment history with a credit card that they are already registered with Apple. (In the past, you would have to manually enter your credit card information, but this is a hassle.)
If parents are unable to set up their children's devices immediately, their children have the option to set up their own iPhone or iPad. Here, Apple automatically applies age-appropriate web content filters to enable pre-installed apps on your device, such as notes, pages, and keynotes. Neither app developers nor Apple can collect child data during this time without parental consent.
Children remind their parents to complete the setup process when they visit the app store and ask them to try to download the app for the first time.
Once the child's setup is completed by a parent, the child can use the App Store and other Apple services under the protection of parent's selected content and app restrictions.
The most notable part of this new system is how third-party developers use this information to verify the age of a child.
New Age Range API for App Developers
Image credit: TechCrunch
Instead of asking children to enter their birthdays, as many social apps do today, developers have the option to use a new declared age range API that allows access to age range information on parent information while setting up child accounts. (The parent can always correct this information if it was originally entered incorrectly).
Through the API, developers can properly customize their app experience to ensure that they have access to the age range of their children. They are not accessible to the child's birth date. Parents can also revoke this permit further down the road if necessary, Apple says.
From a child's perspective, if the app requires age information, you will receive a pop-up message asking if you want to share the age range with the app. This is similar to other permission requests that the app uses to access more private features such as user locations, microphones, cameras, and photo gallery.
It's also a more effective system, considering that children are not curated by age ranges and often lies about their birthdays to access the full app experience.
As an opt-in system, developers need to work on integrating with new APIs. And if any of the state legislative bills move forward, then perhaps some developers or categories of apps will be required by law to do so in the future.
Image credit: Pok Pok
There are more age ranges in the App Store
The final changes include an update to the existing age rating system of the App Store itself. Currently, the app has four age ranges: 4 years old, 9 years old, 12 years old and 17 years old. This new system breaks down teenagers' ages into more granular ranges of 13+, 16+, and 18+, retaining the 4+ and 9+ ranges.
The age range of an app is determined by the developer's responses to a series of questions from Apple about the app's content, as well as the frequency and intensity of that content, the company says.
This helps parents better determine when their child requests a new app, whether the app they ask for is age-appropriate. Additionally, if content restrictions are set, children will be prevented from downloading and updating apps beyond their age range.
Additionally, Apple's App Store does not list limited apps in areas such as Edit Stories, Today, Games, App Tabs, and more.
Some of the changes to your child account are available in the public beta version of IOS 18.4. The ability to update the age of a child's account after it has already been created, as well as the declared age range API, age ratings and app store updates will be available later this year, Apple says.