Brad Littlejohn: Apple on trial

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MARY REICHARD, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: holding Big Tech’s feet to the fire.

Earlier this year the House Energy Committee held a hearing on app store regulations and child safety.

JAMES: It's vital to make sure that we hold our virtual stores to the same standards that we hold our physical stores when it comes to material that is (for) adults or addictive…

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: That’s Michigan representative John James. He criticized Big Tech for putting children at risk, adding that online stores should require the same age verification laws that brick-and-mortar stores do.

JAMES: We don't rely on Marlboro or Budweiser to ensure kids aren't purchasing their products. We look at CVS. We look at 7-Eleven. We look at the supermarkets to age-gate. The app ecosystem should be no different than what is currently established in the United States of America. These app stores are out of touch and they need to come to reality.

REICHARD: We’ve all heard the line that with great power comes great responsibility. But the Big Tech companies say, easier said than done.

WORLD Opinions contributor Brad Littlejohn says it’s time they were forced to accept responsibility, and a new effort is underway to do just that.

BRAD LITTLEJOHN: Last month a new organization launched an assault on Apple’s digital fortress in an attempt to force them to change their ways. The Digital Childhood Institute submitted a 55-page formal complaint to the Federal Trade Commission—documenting more than a decade of the tech giant’s callous violations of child safety and parental rights. The complaint could very well provoke a formal investigation by the FTC as Chairman Andrew Ferguson has shown a fierce commitment to rein in Big Tech and empower parents.

Apple is certainly not the worst offender when it comes to digital threats to childhood—apps like Snapchat and TikTok have been meticulously designed to addict adolescents and feed them age-inappropriate content. Some apps are virtual playgrounds for child sex predators. More recently, other apps have been specifically designed and marketed for their “nudify” capabilities…allowing students to generate deepfake pornography of their classmates.

Apple has attempted to wash its hands of the problem posing as primarily a hardware company…yet it is no innocent bystander to this digital crime scene. It has aggressively marketed smartphones to teens with great success. Nearly 9 out of 10 now own an iPhone despite overwhelming evidence that few of them are ready for the dangers and addictive impulses of these devices. Semi-smart phones, like the Gabb Phone or Wisephone, are designed with the interests of kids and parents in mind. There is no reason that the design wizards in Silicon Valley could not have created such devices many years ago. No reason, that is, except the immense profits to be reaped from selling apps to teens.

As the complaint from the Digital Childhood Institute documents, Apple bears heavy responsibility for today’s youth pornography and mental health crisis.

Most fundamentally, Apple has displayed gross negligence in its vetting and rating of apps. For instance, teens are more likely to find pornography on X than on mainstream porn sites, yet the App Store lists it as having—in its words—“infrequent/mild sexual content or nudity.”

Apps like TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram are rated safe for 12-year-olds, even though they’re well-known for feeding children adult content and connecting them with sexual predators. Grok is also no better, yet is still widely available for minors even with its new widely touted sexual companion feature. Many far more dangerous but less well-known apps have proliferated on the app store for years. Without legal pressure, Apple has every incentive to do minimal vetting…as it is very expensive. And Apple’s bottom line is maximized by the number of apps downloaded…regardless of what they are.

Apple has also consistently deceived parents about the efficacy of its so-called parental controls. Numerous apps operate with “in-app browsers” that serve as backdoors to explicit content even when parental controls are turned on. Some of these apps even suppress third-party controls. As the complaint writes, “Taken together, these practices reveal a pattern of deception and misleading advertising.”

Perhaps worst of all, the entire premise of the App Store is on legally shaky ground, since every app download comes with a contract, a legally binding agreement between the user and the developer. Minors, of course, cannot enter binding contracts without parental consent, and yet Apple has consistently allowed and encouraged anyone 13 or older to enter into these contracts—which usually involve long pages of legalese agreeing to a systematic collection and monetization of their personal data.

Unfortunately, parents are not entirely passive victims of this exploitation. Many have lined up to buy these phones and download these apps for their kids…buying into the lie that their children will be “left behind in a digital world” otherwise. In fact, the children who are flourishing most today are those who have kept their feet firmly anchored in the analog world.

But parents need help in the battle against $3 trillion companies. If the FTC will take firm action on this complaint, millions more children may be able to enjoy childhood again, rather than being dragged prematurely into digital adulthood.

I’m Brad Littlejohn.

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