Thanks to iOS 26.4 for sponsoring this vote. /s

In this new update, users with UK Apple Accounts are asked to verify their age via a credit card, or an ID scan. (there seems to be an Account age check too — if the Apple Account is old enough then no additional steps are required.)

I don’t know what Apple’s ID verification implementation looks like, and I hope it is either in-house (no third party) or offline (some vision model validates the ID locally, then send a “yeah” bit back to Apple), but this Age Verification flow seems to be designed to be low friction, compared to other flows that require a selfie video to a third party website.

BUT.
BUT.
BUT.

More people would go along with the low friction flow, because, well, it’s easier, it’s faster, there’s fewer unknown shady companies involved. I used to draw the line there — I used to think giving out credit card info or mobile phone number for age verification is fine (since the information is already out there).

Then, a friend who upgraded to iOS 26.4 but have not verified her age could no longer access some websites because the Web Content Filter (and Messages Communications Safety) are automatically turned on until age verification is completed.

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mate, if you can’t do what you want on a device unless some server somewhere has to have the “correct” boolean, you don’t own that device.

(this leaves an interesting question, is this a device-level restriction or an account-level restriction? will an iPhone that does not have an Apple Account associated be subject to this limitation?)