Apple celebrates safer internet day with Tips for Parents 

By Dana Malcolm

Staff Writer

February 20, 2023 – Safer Internet Day was celebrated on February 7th and smartphone developer Apple held classes for parents advertising its suite of child safety features and how to use them to protect your child while they use their iPhone, Mac or iPad.

While some of the features are not yet available in the Caribbean region, Apple has promised that they will be rolled out to more regions soon.

Communication Safety

Linked to the Apple Messaging app this feature is designed to give an alert to children when they receive or attempt to share a nude photo.  Apple has maintained that the feature, already rolled out in the US, UK, New Zealand and more, does not record or keep the photos,

“If Messages detects that a child receives or is attempting to send this type of photo, Messages blurs the photo before it’s viewed on your child’s device and provides guidance and age-appropriate resources to help them make a safe choice, including contacting someone they trust if they choose.  Messages use on-device machine learning to analyze image attachments and determine if a photo appears to contain nudity.  The feature is designed so that Apple doesn’t get access to the photos and no one outside the chat can see them.”

Child Account Setup

This is a feature available to those using family sharing available for as low as $2.99 and allows you to customize your child’s Iphone, Ipad or mac with parental controls as soon as it is purchased or any time after that will block them from downloading certain apps without your permission as well as other helpful features.

Screen Time:

Get weekly reports on how much time your child is spending online and set limits from your own phone on how much time they can spend on each app and even their device overall.

Communication Limit: 

This allows you to choose who your child can communicate with to an extent, shut off communication after certain times including late at night and block unknown people from contacting them.  Your iPhone also allows you to restrict your child to age appropriate apps and allows you to set restrictions so they can’t purchase apps without your permission.

The permissions, all of which come with a family sharing subscription, are a boon for parents who wish to protect their children online while protecting their privacy and shielding them from predators.  If you want to learn more or need a step by step tutorial apple has specific pages for families with detailed tutorial