Jordan.
Gavin.
Zach.
Mason.
Walker.
Carson.
These are names of teens who have died because of harms they encountered online. And there are many, many more.
Whether it be dying by suicide after experiencing sextortion, not surviving a dangerous Internet challenge, or being sold deadly drugs on online platforms … whatever the details of their story, what they all have in common is that they are no longer with us.
But there is another thing these teens have in common. They were deemed “too old” for many of the protections Big Tech offers children.
The 1998 Children’s Online Privacy and Protection Act (COPPA) has been abused by Big Tech for years, being used as an excuse to treat minors who were 13+ as “digital adults.” This is maddening, especially when research suggests this group of minors is often the most at risk for being harmed online.
For example, a 2024 study from Thorn found that the majority of sextortion victims are 14 to 17-year-old boys. Sextortionists typically send children nude images and manipulate them into send nude images in return. Once received, the minor’s images are used for blackmail. Apple’s “Communications Safety” feature, which blurs sexually explicit images in Messages and Facetime, was intended to insert a speed bump into a sextortion situation. Yet bafflingly, Apple denied this protection to the majority of sextortion victims—13 to 17-year-olds.
Further, studies find that most children first encounter pornography in their early teen years, so Apple denying web content filters to children 13 and older is similarly absurd.
This is why NCOSE and Protect Young Eyes have long advocated for Apple and Google to enable default tech safety features for ALL minors. And with your support, Apple is finally making changes!
What Apple Features are We Talking About?
Two key safety features Apple withheld from 13 to 17-year-olds are:
- Communications Safety, which automatically blurs nude images in Messages, Facetime, Airdrop, and Contact Posters. Although the child can opt unblur the image after reading a warning message (something we would like to see change), this offers a small speed bump in what will often be a grooming or sextortion situation.
- Web Content Filters which help reduce the amount of inappropriate content children are exposed to on web browsers owned and controlled by the manufacturer, including but not limited to pornography.
Yet Apple neglected to extend these protections to children 13 and older, even though they are the ones who need it most.
What’s the Good News?
In September 2025, with the rollout of iOS 26 (for iPhones), iPadOS 26 (for iPads), macOS Tahoe 26 (for MacBooks), and watchOS 26 (for Apple Watches), Apple will automatically enable nudity blurring in iMessages and its “limit adult websites” filter in the Safari browser for all minors ages 0-17.
This is an incredible, hard-won victory!
Building a Safe Internet
How did this Happen?
NCOSE and Protect Young Eyes have spent the last five years pressing on Apple to make these key safety changes, through public pressure and legislative action. Many of you joined us, taking action and signing letters to Apple executives.
The Safer Devices for Kids Act, co-authored by Protect Young Eyes and NCOSE, mandates that smartphones and tablets automatically turn on filters for sexually explicit content for minors—including the 13 to 17 age group that Apple neglected. This legislation passed in Utah and Alabama and is being considered by other states.
Call us cynics, but Big Tech companies typically don’t make safety changes until their feet are held to the fire, and/or it’s a particularly important PR opportunity.
In this case, we believe the combination of public pressure and legislative progress have both played a significant role in Apple deciding to make these changes. If laws will soon force them to do it anyway, the mentality of Big Tech is better do it just before the laws pass, so they can still claim to be making safety changes “voluntarily.”
Another example of legislative progress that helped spur recent Apple changes includes the innovative App Store Accountability Act, now passed in Utah, Texas, and Louisiana.
The App Store Accountability Act requires app stores to verify the age of users before allowing them to download age-restricted apps, requires parental consent for minors to download apps or make in-app purchases, and requires app stores have accurate age ratings to inform parents about the dangers on an app. Apple has fought this bill tooth and nail, with CEO Tim Cook even calling the Governor of Texas asking him to veto it.
Pressing on Apple to make their App Store safer has been a key focus of NCOSE’s and PYE’s joint advocacy in recent years. Although Apple has not yet gone as far as we wanted, the September software updates will also include small improvements to their app store which indicate that they’re feeling the pressure.
Now, when a parent sets app content restrictions for their child, apps with age ratings that exceed those restrictions will be hidden from the App Store in places like the Today, Games, and Apps tabs, or in editorial stories. Further, App Store product pages will now share whether apps contain user-generated content, messaging, or advertising capabilities, and if they include any in-app content controls like parental controls or age assurance (based on information provided by the app developer).
Although these changes need to go further, Apple is clearly responding to our collective action!
Now, we need Google to prioritize the same default protections for Androids in its Family Link parental controls. Will you take action today?
