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iPhone's New Parental Controls Block Sex Ed, Allow Violence and Racism (vice.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the pick-and-choose dept.

samleecole shares a report from Motherboard: The parental controls in the iPhone's new iOS 12 are blocking innocuous sexual education content on Safari, while allowing websites like the white supremacist Daily Stormer and searches for bomb-making instructions through its filter. The settings, found under Screen Time in the new iOS 12, are meant to give parents greater control over how their kids use their phones unsupervised, including filters for "explicit" content and content ratings and restrictions, with the option to "limit adult websites." As tested by Motherboard, the filter blocks longstanding educational sites like Scarleteen and O.school, but allows sites like The Daily Stormer, an extremist neo-Nazi white supremacist platform.

The filter in question "limits adult websites" on Safari. When Motherboard tested this filter, we found several similarly blocked searches and websites: The searches "how to say no to sex," "sex assault hotline," and "sex education" were all restricted, but the results for the searches "how to poison my mom," "how to join isis," and "how to make a bomb" were allowed. 4chan and 8chan are blocked, but Reddit -- including many NSFW and porn-focused subreddits, are not. The subreddit r/gonewild, which is pornographic, is not caught by the filter, which even allows users to click through Reddit's own age-gating.

19 of 185 comments (clear)

  1. Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by kenwd0elq · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This has always puzzled me. Violence and murder, on film or in TV programming, is generally allowed, with a "PG" or "R" rating or equivalent. Sex is rated "X" or "XXX" depending on the explicitness. And yet, in real life, most people (outside Chicago, at least) will probably never witness a murder or experience a shooting.

    But most people WILL see and touch and have sex with other naked people, hopefully many thousands of times. Seems to me that we should celebrate depictions of sex,and discourage depictions of murder.

    1. Re:Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 4, Insightful

      This has always puzzled me. Violence and murder, on film or in TV programming, is generally allowed, with a "PG" or "R" rating or equivalent. Sex is rated "X" or "XXX" depending on the explicitness. And yet, in real life, most people (outside Chicago, at least) will probably never witness a murder or experience a shooting.

      But most people WILL see and touch and have sex with other naked people, hopefully many thousands of times. Seems to me that we should celebrate depictions of sex,and discourage depictions of murder.

      Well, perhaps you explained it right there.

      We're not worried that depictions of murder will sully your real experience of murder.

      We're not worried that depictions of murder will twist your development away from being a healthy murderer.

    2. Re:Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by e3m4n · · Score: 2

      well porn on the internet has definitely degraded from just naked people to some pretty dark shit. When I was a kid the 'porn' we watched was staying up late to see some cinemax (skinimax) r rated movies where its rated R for 'nutidy, and strong sexual content', commonly referred to as a tenage-fuck-flick.

      the shit they watch now is stuff you do once you've burned through all the lighter porn content and you need something stronger to keep you from getting burned out. Not exactly the things kids should _start_ with. Hell some shit on the internet includes simulated rape and sometimes rape with some strangulation and fake killing at the end. Thats pretty scarring shit to see for a lot of people, but especially someone in their mid teens. Not really a great idea to let kids get exposed to that. So I'm ok with the porn filters. If they want to learn about sex they can hit up netflix with their parents profile and watch some r rated fuck-flicks like we did or ask their parents about more normal sex questions.

      I wouldn't mind more filters to rate violence in videos to have a finer grain of control. Its harder to filter written content since there are way too many ways to game the system anway. If your filter is just based on key words they always find a way around it. Its the same reason why you still get spam despite having spam filters.

    3. Re:Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by Etcetera · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This has always puzzled me. Violence and murder, on film or in TV programming, is generally allowed, with a "PG" or "R" rating or equivalent. Sex is rated "X" or "XXX" depending on the explicitness. And yet, in real life, most people (outside Chicago, at least) will probably never witness a murder or experience a shooting.

      Are you an American? If so, the answer should be obvious. The US culturally has a certain outlook on the profane and the sacred, steming partially from its Puritan roots and partly from the ethics of the time as the US spread west. Explicit sexuality is protected more, while the more violent aspects are seen as... well, just part of life.

      It's pretty much the exact opposite of the European/Old World view on these matters, where sex is presented far more openly in real life, but guns are harder to come by. And in entertainment, sex and nudity gets a pass while violence will lead to more restrictive movie and video game ratings (or be censored out).

      When people (like the GP, honestly) complain about US views on sex and violence, they're usually just whining about it without addressing the underlying principle: the US is simply different about these things. It's a different cultural choice. It doesn't mean you're oppressed, and it doesn't mean that parental-management tools (such as this) are wrong for having different default choices than you'd prefer.

      --
      Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
    4. Re:Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by sjames · · Score: 4, Informative

      X used to be an actual official rating and could be applied for various non-porn content (for example, the first edit of Robocop). However, once it became synonymous with porn in the public's mind, it was replaced by NC-17. XXX was always unofficial and used exclusively for porn marketing.

    5. Re:Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 4, Insightful

      and it doesn't mean that parental-management tools (such as this) are wrong for having different default choices than you'd prefer.
      Yes, they are wrong.

      A 14 year old and above has the right to inform her/himself about sex related questions. And if parents block that, it is clear signal that the parents are not the right persons to ask. Also it seems you missed to read the summary: "sex assault hotline", why the funk would a search like this be blocked?

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    6. Re:Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by butzwonker · · Score: 2

      But you're worried that showing a nipple or not bleeping a swear word will cause the immediate destruction and damnation of someone's soul, right? LOL.

    7. Re:Steve Jobs Was a Prude - And Apple Still Is by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Extreme porn isn't really the issue for kids though, it's the potential consequences.

      Sex can get someone pregnant, a pretty serious state of affairs with life long ramifications. We have to teach kids about it and how to be responsible, and we tend to be bad at doing that. Also porn can cause mental health problems for kids due to body image issues and pressure to act a certain way or do certain things. Again education helps but we are somewhat bad at it.

      Violence is of course also quite serious, but kids tend to be exposed to it quite early on regardless of the movies they watch, and develop an understanding of the consequences and responsibilities. Socially it's easier to talk about and to teach kids about.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  2. Welcome to the USA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    You can show decapitations during prime time, but one flash of a nipple and the FCC will fine you $325,000.

    1. Re:Welcome to the USA by e3m4n · · Score: 2

      on this I can agree, there should be tiers of nude content ratings. Just naked body parts being on the low end, where rape/snuff being at the highest end. Maybe not get so uptight on a nip slip or seeing a woman step out of a shower naked, whereas maybe still say no to open crotch shots.

  3. Re: GNAA - HITS ALL THREE FUCKING APPLE - GAY NIGG by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    No.
    The 1st ammendment allows slashdot to delete or block that crap, not the government.

    Just flag the post and move on.

  4. If you're letting your pre-teen have an iphone by Spy+Handler · · Score: 4, Insightful

    you're doing the parenting thing wrong.

    Steve Jobs himself wouldn't let his own kids anywhere near an iPhone or an iPad.

  5. Issues with values by duke_cheetah2003 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I really don't understand this kind of thing. It's just fine to see the most horrific violence imaginable, but you can't see someone's penis or breasts. What the hell?

    Is it just me, or would the more ideal world be where this is completely reversed?

    1. Re:Issues with values by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      As a kid I stumbled across a few horror movies. I survived and they didn't make me go obliterate every doll I saw, I didn't rip my face off, nor do I engage in cannibalism. Sure I always made sure my closet was locked when I went to bed, but so what. That's part of growing up.

      The reason kids get such a distorted view of sex is because it's restricted. It's easier to come across harder core porn than it is to find good information about real sex. And I mean actual pictures, not low quality diagrams with tons of missing info. Where you taught about the more than 3 holes females have between their legs and that males don't have to ejaculate and orgasm at the same time? Sex ed is horrible. Everyone knows moves and TV stories are make believe. But there is no sex education about porn so kids don't realize it's also make believe. They can't see regular sex vids and real advice about sex because those types of sites are all restricted. The harder core stuff jumps around from domain to domain so the blacklists rarely keep up.

      If you want kids to not be traumatized by snuff films and maggots eating your balls out, then you need to stop banning everything so they can also see what normal is supposed to be. You'll never block all the maggots.

  6. And this is why we don't need to fear "AI" by BeaverCleaver · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Simple things like this are the reason I don't fear AI taking over any time soon. After 25+ years of trying, internet filters still don't work. After 20 years of trying, predictive text is no better than it was in 1999.

    --
    sustainable living
  7. Re:Stop it by e3m4n · · Score: 2, Insightful

    as a libertarian Im all for having more tools, as a parent, to decide what is and what is not ok. Obviously there are some good things to the internet in terms of research power, etc. And there is a whole lot of bad shit too. The more granular and more power I have to exempt or ban specific things that slip through, or get caught by, a filter is never a bad thing. Having the tools gives the parents to choose how much or how little to implement. Ultimately its still their choice. If letting your 6yr old watch the original Jurrasic Park (R) in the theatre because its about dinosaurs is ok with you, well Im not the one who has to deal with the kids traumatized with nightmares. Thats on them. Me, well I'm trying to keep my kids maintaining a healthy baseline of normalcy without trying to stiffel them more than absolutely necessary to prevent them obtaining some unhealthy or unrealistic view/opinion on things.

  8. Re:What a shame by Opportunist · · Score: 3

    Last time I checked the "left loonies" are the ones that have less problems with their kids knowing how their body works than their kids being subjected to hate and violence.

    So... I guess you're barking up the wrong tree here.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  9. Whitelist by markdavis · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Blacklists and keyword filters (what Apple is trying to do) *never* work like you think they will. The WWW is far, far, far too big and complicated for any such grandiose scheme to ever hope to tame. Even a site like Wikipedia is far too diverse, frank, and complex (I have seen plenty of shocking things there not suitable for children).

    The only thing that works is a whitelist- allowing one to visit ONLY the specifically sites in an approved list. Of course, this is extremely restrictive and often not practical. Personally, I would not allow young children unsupervised access to non-whitelisted web, ever. As they get older, I would continuously expand the whitelist until eventually flipping over to a blacklist.

  10. No problem for U.S. by bjwest · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Here in the U.S., sex is taboo, and heaven forbid we try to teach it to our children. Violence and racism? Those are prime time material, and OK to show to anyone of any age.

    --

    --- Keep the choice with the user..