Apple also brings to Italy the features for the safety of children who use its devices: in the coming weeks the company will release a update for iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and Mac which will allow parents who have set up a family sharing to activate the communication security filter and prevent receiving or sending images containing nudity from Apple devices. Basically, a first line of defense against sexting, which in Italy affects two out of three boys.
Functionality, which now becomes available in Italy and Spain, was already activated last winter in the US and other English-speaking countries and then in France and Germany. The protection mechanism applies to all persons registered as children in the family sharing and who in any case are under 18 years old. For children under 14, the language used in the warnings about sharing photos containing nudity and other features is written differently and designed to be better understood by kids and children.
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The main security feature concerns the sending or receiving of photos unsuitable for a minor, i.e. containing nudity, through the Messages app, but it does not concern other messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Telegram, or as Direct and Messenger. Photos containing nudity exchanged with messaging apps, especially by preteens, can be sexting, that is, sexually explicit images often taken by young people to themselves.
If the function is activated by parents, the Messages app will alert children or preteens when they receive or send photos that contain nudity. The received image is blurred and the child is warned, furthermore the child is informed that he is free to choose not to see the photo. Protections similar to those of the reception are also present in case a child tries to send a photo that contains nude images: in both cases, children can send a message to a trusted person to ask for help or advice.
The peculiarity of this function is that it was designed by Apple trying to preserve the greatest possible degree of people’s privacy: the company has created a artificial intelligence system which is present in the device and which is able to analyze and recognize photos without the need for human intervention and without the need to upload photos to the company’s servers. In this way, the transmission of messages remains encrypted and inaccessible to third parties. In short: the feature has been designed in such a way that no indication of nudity detection leaves the phone and Apple claims online that it does not have access to the messages and not to automatically send notifications to parents or others.
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In addition to this new feature, which is the main one of the update for the Italian and Spanish language, there are also other news always for the safety of minors and for help parents stay safe online: for example, Siri now answers questions about reporting physical or psychological violence to minors by indicating how to file a complaint. Also, Siri, Spotlight (the internal search engine of Apple devices) and browser search Safari have been updated to send a message when users search for sex and child abuse. The message explains that interest in this topic is harmful and problematic and provides resources to get help on the topic.
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