Apple has announced a new “age assurance” system to address concerns about child safety and privacy in app usage. This system will let parents share a child’s age range with app developers without revealing sensitive information like birthdays or government ID numbers.
Apple says it will bring a way for parents to share the age of a child with app developers without revealing sensitive information such as birthdays or government identification numbers. This comes as a number of U.S. state and federal lawmakers consider age-verification laws for social media and other apps.
States, such as Utah and South Carolina, are currently debating laws that would require app store operators such as Apple and Alphabet’s Google to check the ages of users. This has created a conflict in the tech industry over which party should be responsible for checking ages for users under 18 – app stores, or each individual app.
Meta, for instance, has long argued in favor of legislation requiring app stores to check ages when a child downloads an app. Apple says it does not want to be responsible for collecting sensitive data for those age verifications.
As an alternative, Apple said it will roll out what it calls “age assurance.” Using it, parents will be able to input a child’s age when setting up a child’s account. The parent can then choose to allow the child to share what Apple calls a “declared age range” – rather than an exact birthday or other identifying information – with third-party app developers. The parent will have the ability to turn off age-range sharing.
In a statement, Stephanie Otway, a Meta spokeswoman, said the Apple technology is “a positive first step” but it still requires the child to share age range data with the developer, which will make it more difficult for Meta to put to use.
“Parents tell us they want to have the final say over the apps their teens use, and that’s why we support legislation that requires app stores to verify a child’s age and get a parent’s approval before their child downloads an app,”
Otway said.
Apple’s existing controls already require parental approval for children to download an app.
More here.