The iPad needs to have a Kid mode

[RaduTyrsina]

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I remember waiting for my friend at the mall and noticing a family having coffee and cookies at some café nearby. But what really drew my attention to the whole scene, was their kid. He must have been no more than 3 or 4 but he was fiercely engaged in a game (probably?) on his parents’ iPad. I just stood there wondering at the dexterity with which he managed the gadget. But is the iPad child-friendly?

Apparently not. In the case described above, the parents were with their kid and they probably opened the application he was so focused on. But what happens if you leave your iPad unattended and your 4 year old stumbles upon it? Well, in the U.K, parents were in shock when they found out that their 5 year old b​​
oy accidently purchased $2,500 worth of apps in no less than 15 minutes. For him it was just play, for their parents it was a nightmare. Thankfully. Apple refunded the money back to the parents.

So, shouldn’t the Cupertino tech giant start thinking more seriously how younger users are interacting with its products and act accordingly? For example, the company could set a “kid sign in†that should be used by kids in a safe mode. Looking in the Android camp, we can see that solutions have been found to the problem like KIDO’Z, Kytephone, Play Safe and others. Why aren’t these apps extrapolated to the iOS environment, we wonder?

Source: TechCrunch

 

[KevinJS]

While it is true that the default settings of iOS allow multiple purchases to be made without input of the password each time, it is a simple enough matter to set the iPad to require the password for each purchase.

Settings/General/Restrictions/Require Password

Furthermore, the Restrictions area of Settings can be used to customize a whole heap of settings before handing it over to Junior.

There is also the Guided Access mode which allows a parent to lock the iPad into a single app, and requires a password to gain access to any others.

The example cited could have been avoided simply by setting a Passcode. It's not always Apple's fault. Parents have to take some responsibility upon themselves, occasionally.

 

[kierandill]

Agreed - screen lock your $800 iPad and get little Johnny one of these $150 android, rubber-encased kids tablets to chew on.