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Whatever Europe's crazy data privacy laws, it's ridiculous they'd apply to the case of a parent keeping track of their kids. The kid's right to wander into craz

Whatever Europe's crazy data privacy laws, it's ridiculous they'd apply to the case of a parent keeping track of their kids. The kid's right to wander into crazy elsagate videos and have covert online conversations with predators unsupervised is more important than the parent's right to protect their kid, and Apple is justified in ripping the monitoring capability out of parents' hands? Is that what you're saying? Hopefully the parents either switch to Android if such a thing is still possible on Android or just get them flip phones with no data plan intended only for emergency calls. Where they can get a list of sent/received calls at the end of the month from the cellphone company at least, I assume.

geofft 8y ago
On an ethical argument (not a what-does-the-law-say-now argument), it seems defensible for kids (over a certain age, perhaps) to have reliable channels that their parents can't monitor. It's how you realize your family is abusive and get help when they are (the same arguments apply to people in abusive romantic relationships having their own digital root-of-trust that their partner doesn't have access to). It's how you find out that other people are queer too and it's not just you when your parents won't tell you anything. Your argument also has merit, and I don't know where the balance is, but I don't think it's entirely one or the other.
- jimmaswell 8y ago
  Over a certain age, yes, probably starting at high school. Sex ed and history classes should go over LGBT stuff and teachers/guidance counselors are supposed to be avenues for getting help for abuse, not that these two things work out right all the time in practice.
sjwright 8y ago
Please be careful to separate the principle from the implementation. What the app developers had done was unquestionably against the developer terms. They would have known it was wrong. And Apple was right to stop them. These apps were dodgy. They effectively became a new and incredibly convenient vector for an app developer to spy on children. It's disgusting that people defend them.
rgallagher27 8y ago
No what they're saying is that if you want to monitor your child mobile usage, handing over full access of their phone to a 3rd party developer isn't the way to go about it.
tbirrell 8y ago
Its not about parental access. Its about third party access. Unfortunately, allowing parental access means that the device is vulnerable to malicious actors also gaining access.
Fradow 8y ago
This is not about Europe data privacy laws. It's about businesses misusing APIs in a way not intended by Apple. MDMs are meant to allow a business to manage its devices through a third-party provider. They are NOT meant for personal usage, as they are privacy and security issues (who do you turn to when your device is bricked by your MDM?). This is not the first time Apple is shutting down businesses misuing its APIs, and it won't Apple. Should Apple provide parental control APIs? That's a separate issue. They currently don't have enough, and user who wants more can indeed switch to Android.
terracatta 8y ago
You realize these apps give strangers the ability to monitor your child’s phone? The company is running an MDM server and has unfettered access to the phone via the MDM APIs. They may choose to offer parents a subset of that access in their Ui for the purposes you present above, but the fact remains they basically fully control your full consumer device. Do you think that is an appropriate level of access to grant? Parents don’t need to switch to Android, they have tools built into iOS that offer the features they need without essentially giving away the device to a third party company.
hbosch 8y ago
> The kid's right to wander into crazy elsagate videos and have covert online conversations with predators unsupervised is more important than the parent's right to protect their kid, and Apple is justified in ripping the monitoring capability out of parents' hands? Is that what you're saying? No one is saying that. Just like privacy laws don’t exist to protect encrypted hard drives full of pedophilia. The right to privacy does NOT enable or endorse deviancy or illicit behavior! At all! Privacy is a human right, not an adult right. Kids do deserve to have an assumption that when they are texting with their friends that their parents aren’t watching them. Especially teenagers. What about the young boy in a conservative Christian family who is struggling with his sexual identity? What about the young girl who is trying to learn how to report her abusive family members? These are the reasons why children’s privacy are important. Young people need their own secure places to express themselves and form an identity — that doesn’t happen, thankfully, under parental supervision. That said, of course it’s a parent’s job to protect their children. But spying on a personal device like a cell phone is oppressive and paranoid.
- jimmaswell 8y ago
  I went over abuse reporting/sexual identity in another comment, but to your point about right to privacy, I don't think there's a reasonable absolute right to privacy as a kid, at least not before maybe high school or late middle school. This doesn't mean no alone time with friends, but at least at elementary school age, internet should be monitored, and phone location tracking is certainly reasonable before high school.
blub 8y ago
All your far-fetched scenarios can already be blocked by standard iOS functionality. The kids are safe, no need to think about them.
scarface74 8y ago
it's ridiculous they'd apply to the case of a parent keeping track of their kids. The kid's right to wander into crazy elsagate videos and have covert online conversations with predators unsupervised is more important than the parent's right to protect their kid, and Apple is justified in ripping the monitoring capability out of parents' hands? Is that what you're saying? You mean the same app that allows a random third party company to record and track everything that your child does on his phone? Yes and switching to ^Android* that has built in Google surveillance that tracks every time you open an app and also has a horrible security record is really a better alternative.

geofft 8y ago

On an ethical argument (not a what-does-the-law-say-now argument), it seems defensible for kids (over a certain age, perhaps) to have reliable channels that their parents can't monitor. It's how you realize your family is abusive and get help when they are (the same arguments apply to people in abusive romantic relationships having their own digital root-of-trust that their partner doesn't have access to). It's how you find out that other people are queer too and it's not just you when your parents won't tell you anything. Your argument also has merit, and I don't know where the balance is, but I don't think it's entirely one or the other.

jimmaswell 8y ago
Over a certain age, yes, probably starting at high school. Sex ed and history classes should go over LGBT stuff and teachers/guidance counselors are supposed to be avenues for getting help for abuse, not that these two things work out right all the time in practice.

sjwright 8y ago

Please be careful to separate the principle from the implementation. What the app developers had done was unquestionably against the developer terms. They would have known it was wrong. And Apple was right to stop them. These apps were dodgy. They effectively became a new and incredibly convenient vector for an app developer to spy on children. It's disgusting that people defend them.

rgallagher27 8y ago

No what they're saying is that if you want to monitor your child mobile usage, handing over full access of their phone to a 3rd party developer isn't the way to go about it.

tbirrell 8y ago

Its not about parental access. Its about third party access. Unfortunately, allowing parental access means that the device is vulnerable to malicious actors also gaining access.

Fradow 8y ago

This is not about Europe data privacy laws. It's about businesses misusing APIs in a way not intended by Apple. MDMs are meant to allow a business to manage its devices through a third-party provider. They are NOT meant for personal usage, as they are privacy and security issues (who do you turn to when your device is bricked by your MDM?). This is not the first time Apple is shutting down businesses misuing its APIs, and it won't Apple. Should Apple provide parental control APIs? That's a separate issue. They currently don't have enough, and user who wants more can indeed switch to Android.

terracatta 8y ago

You realize these apps give strangers the ability to monitor your child’s phone? The company is running an MDM server and has unfettered access to the phone via the MDM APIs. They may choose to offer parents a subset of that access in their Ui for the purposes you present above, but the fact remains they basically fully control your full consumer device. Do you think that is an appropriate level of access to grant? Parents don’t need to switch to Android, they have tools built into iOS that offer the features they need without essentially giving away the device to a third party company.

hbosch 8y ago

> The kid's right to wander into crazy elsagate videos and have covert online conversations with predators unsupervised is more important than the parent's right to protect their kid, and Apple is justified in ripping the monitoring capability out of parents' hands? Is that what you're saying? No one is saying that. Just like privacy laws don’t exist to protect encrypted hard drives full of pedophilia. The right to privacy does NOT enable or endorse deviancy or illicit behavior! At all! Privacy is a human right, not an adult right. Kids do deserve to have an assumption that when they are texting with their friends that their parents aren’t watching them. Especially teenagers. What about the young boy in a conservative Christian family who is struggling with his sexual identity? What about the young girl who is trying to learn how to report her abusive family members? These are the reasons why children’s privacy are important. Young people need their own secure places to express themselves and form an identity — that doesn’t happen, thankfully, under parental supervision. That said, of course it’s a parent’s job to protect their children. But spying on a personal device like a cell phone is oppressive and paranoid.

jimmaswell 8y ago
I went over abuse reporting/sexual identity in another comment, but to your point about right to privacy, I don't think there's a reasonable absolute right to privacy as a kid, at least not before maybe high school or late middle school. This doesn't mean no alone time with friends, but at least at elementary school age, internet should be monitored, and phone location tracking is certainly reasonable before high school.

blub 8y ago

All your far-fetched scenarios can already be blocked by standard iOS functionality. The kids are safe, no need to think about them.

scarface74 8y ago

it's ridiculous they'd apply to the case of a parent keeping track of their kids. The kid's right to wander into crazy elsagate videos and have covert online conversations with predators unsupervised is more important than the parent's right to protect their kid, and Apple is justified in ripping the monitoring capability out of parents' hands? Is that what you're saying? You mean the same app that allows a random third party company to record and track everything that your child does on his phone? Yes and switching to ^Android* that has built in Google surveillance that tracks every time you open an app and also has a horrible security record is really a better alternative.