OPINION:
Apple knowingly sells apps that use artificial intelligence to peddle revenge and child pornography to buyers. What’s most surprising is that it markets these apps to 4-year-olds.
You may have never heard of “nudify” apps, but they use AI to transform a normal photo of a clothed person into a photo of that person naked. The tech does nothing to protect children. In Florida, 13- and 14-year-old boys used a nudify app to take pictures of their 12-year-old classmates, digitally unclothed the photos and shared them with other classmates. An investigation into the app’s availability on Apple’s App Store revealed that the company had rated the app in question as appropriate for 4-year-olds.
Although Apple removed three nudify apps from its store after public outcry, it’s important to note than more than 1,000 new apps are published to the store every day. Unsurprisingly, generative AI apps with nudification capabilities pretending to be “art generation” and “face swap” apps easily slip through Apple’s censors, and the company doesn’t really care. It would rather remove three offensive apps, pat itself on the back as protectors of children and call it a day.
This sort of conduct proves that Apple must be stripped of its monopolistic powers. Congressional Republicans are moving to do just that with a pair of bills that would curb Fortune 100 companies from running roughshod over families. Rep. John James, Michigan, Republican, introduced the App Store Accountability Act, which would mandate parental approvals and age verification to protect children online.
If minimum-wage convenience store clerks bear the responsibility of verifying the ages of their customers before selling them an age-restricted product, surely tech behemoths can do the same.
What has happened to our society that a Fortune 500 company is profiting from selling products like nudify apps to toddlers? Apple has billions of reasons why it doesn’t want to change the status quo of leaving America’s children at the mercy of predatory apps. In 2024, Apple’s App Store facilitated nearly $406 billion in sales, and Apple takes a 30% fee for every third-party app sold through the store.
Beyond commonsense protections for families online, Congress must create a regulatory landscape that lets parents vote with their feet. Rep. Kat Cammack, Florida Republican and the head of the Republican Study Committee’s AI Task Force, is also working to check Big Tech. Her App Store Freedom Act attacks the youth safety problem from a different angle by chipping away at the monopolistic market position Apple enjoys. The bipartisan legislation would establish a fair and competitive mobile app marketplace and offer parents customizable tools to protect their children online.
“I want folks to imagine for a moment,” Ms. Cammack said at a Dec. 2 committee hearing, “what it would look like if parents were allowed to build an online marketplace, an app marketplace where they could vet the apps and know for sure that their kids were safe.” Any parent would agree that she offers a very appealing proposal.
Monopolies are infamous for price gouging. That’s the core market behavior that makes consumers notice monopolies in the first place. Apple is adept at price gouging, but there are other good reasons that monopolies are illegal. We want innovation, quality and safety, and by their very nature, monopolies fail to produce any of these.
You can judge a Silicon Valley giant by its fruits, and Apple makes no distinction between the use of AI to, say, cure disease or nudify a child — so long as it gets its 30% cut.
Tech watchdogs know there is a better way. Joel Thayer, president of the Digital Progress Institute, has been a leading critic of tech monopolies. “More competition means more tools. More tools mean more access for parents. So, at the end of the day, competition is another area where we can actually increase parental controls and privacy. Right now, there is no free market in the app store market,” he told Congress.
As Congress examines legislation to protect children online, the App Store Accountability Act and App Store Freedom Act stand out as two of the strongest, most practical proposed solutions. The former tackles the problem head-on and equips parents with the tools they need to keep their own children safe, while the App Store Freedom Act addresses the monopoly problem lurking beneath the child safety problem.
As the midterms approach, Republicans have their best chance in a generation to help Big Family score a much-needed victory against Apple and Big Tech.
• Terry Schilling is the president of American Principles Project. Follow him on X @Schilling1776.
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