Apple and Google could help with child safety online by determining a user's age at device setup and sharing it with apps implementing child safety features
What the proposal settles — and what it deliberately leaves open — is the question Meta and other developers have pressed: whether apps or app stores own age assurance. The related tensions between Meta, Apple, and Google over who checks for minors show the platform-level answer is contested, and a 2022 Pixalate study finding most popular children's apps leak location data to advertisers underscores why the current self-declared system is under scrutiny.
First-order effects
App developers would receive a device-attested age range instead of relying on self-entered birthdates, giving child safety features a signal they can act on at first launch.
Apple and Google would take on the compliance burden of age determination, converting their setup flows into regulatory infrastructure for every app on their stores.
Second-order effects
Meta and other app makers gain the store-level mechanism they have lobbied for, weakening their argument that Apple and Google are shirking child safety duties.
State age-verification laws get a ready-made compliance path through the platform layer, as Apple's Texas APIs already demonstrate — turning app stores into the de facto enforcement point for state legislatures.
Third-order effects
If device-level age attestation becomes the norm, app stores consolidate power as trust intermediaries — deciding who counts as a minor and what data about age flows to third parties, with the privacy tradeoffs (age data shared with apps) that regulators would need to police.
The pattern points toward platform-level compliance becoming a competitive moat: smaller app distributors without the setup-flow leverage to verify ages at scale would face higher costs meeting the same state mandates.
The trend: As state age-verification laws multiply, Apple and Google are converting device setup into compliance infrastructure, shifting age assurance from individual apps to the platform layer that controls the stores.
2) Require mobile devices (phones and tablets) sold in the US to include a flow, triggered during initial setup, that asks if the primary user is a child and stores their birthdate locally. The calculated age (rounded to year) should be provided via API to every app.
I think @alexstamos idea at the center of this article is an interesting one, although as we saw with Apple's proposed on-device CSAM scanning plan, there are so many ways that something like this could go very wrong. My mind always goes to closeted queer kids with shitty parents
Overall this is an excellent and well-reported article from @issielapowsky but i'm gonna be real: i HATE the headline [If Facebook and TikTok can't keep kids safe, maybe Apple can]. This is exactly the type of thinking that has gotten us into the mess in the first place. Relying …
4) Require app stores to allow uploaded apps to age gate on the stored age from #2. Again, hard to decide who sees exactly what but we can create the infra to allow for appropriate gating. (Somebody pointed out Tinder was recommended to her kid on Apple's store)
One thing I agree with Alex here is that the OS platforms should be helping protect kids more. Match has complained in the past that the App Store should prevent kids from downloading apps instead of every app having to either turn a blind eye or come up with a custom mitigation.…
If every kid were issued a free device at birth, @alexstamos's idea could work: “Require mobile devices sold in the US to ask during setup whether the primary user is a child and their birthdate; then allow apps access via user age API.” https://www.protocol.com/... #DigitalDivid…
And Apple itself is engaged in a number of practices that are actively harming kids and undermining human rights globally, most prominently its monopolistic, puritanical and restrictive app store policies, which serve as a convenient choke point for government censorship etc
Similarly the idea that teens having bad experiences online is a problem facing only one app which isn't even the 1st or 2nd most popular app amongst teens is swapping good versus bad narratives for actual informative or insightful reporting. We should be talking about solutions …
@issielapowsky To be clear, I do think that there is a responsibility for Facebook, Snap, TikTok and other apps used by kids/teens. Living up to the responsibility is much easier with somewhat dependable age information, preferably without privacy violations like ID checks.
@issielapowsky Not to belabor it, but in a weird way I think that both Apple and Facebook would like this headline. For Facebook it sort of lets them off the hook and for Apple it helps their narrative that they are the privacy defenders protecting us from the Facebooks of the wo…
3) Require apps that will allow users under 18 to publish their child safety plans for each of the relevant age ranges above. We are way too early in the field to have a unified set of product features that work for everybody, but we can at least encourage thoughtful design.
5) As part of broader legislation, require cooperation with independent researchers under reasonable privacy controls (this is complex). There will be more details on this soon from a group I'm part of.
NEW: Everyone wants to do *something* to protect kids online, but nobody trusts platforms to fix the problems they enabled. What if part of the answer lies with device makers? Why aren't they a bigger part of the conversation? https://www.protocol.com/... h/t to @alexstamos
Maybe we should stop asking Facebook to keep kids safe online because that doesn't seem to be going very well. Instead, some argue device makers and app store providers could be a better answer. https://www.protocol.com/...
I spoke to Protocol about how we need to make sure attempts to protect kids and teens online don't undermine the ability of marginalized young people to use the Internet to find community, participate in organizing and activism, and express themselves https://www.protocol.com/...
Sen. Lee is asking about Apple's age ratings for Instagram and Facebook. Davis says: “I would really love for you to invite Apple to answer those questions.” Actually same: https://www.protocol.com/... (Blumenthal said they'd be calling other companies)