Kids outsmart Apple's new parental controls
As device usage and smartphone addiction increases and the impact of social media becomes increasingly negative, Apple announces a new IOS 12 update feature which focuses on "digital health".
It allows users to set restrictions on how much time is spent on apps, and schedule “downtime” in which certain apps cannot be used at all. A great tool to allow parents to impose restrictions on their children’s device usage — or so they thought.
As most parents will agree, kids are always one step ahead. Recently, on an r/apple Reddit discussion, parents began sharing stories about how their children are beating the new settings on their Apple devices.
“When iOS 12 came out I limited my 7-year old son’s screen time through the family share. For a few days I felt like he was playing a bit more than he should, but I couldn't figure out why,” one parent stated.
“Finally today, my son revealed his hack: When he runs out of screen time and his games get locked, he heads to App Store, downloads a previously installed (but later removed) game through the cloud icon, and it works without limitations!”
[NB: The story is from a company, ikydz, that sells Internet Parental Control software.--martyb]
(Score: 2) by nobu_the_bard on Tuesday October 22 2019, @02:26PM
Yeah, the issue is the kids have all the time in the world to figure out how to get around it or break it, but the developer's time is far more limited.
I've helped out school IT administrators in the past who were losing control their networks one piece at a time. They didn't have time to learn how to properly lock things down on their own, and their quick hacks didn't stand up to kids constantly testing them.