Apple Requires Device-Level Age Verification in the UK Now. Could the US Be Next?

Apple Requires Device-Level Age Verification in the UK Now. Could the US Be Next?

Users under 18 will have to deal with restrictions and anti-nudity text monitoring.

BY ECE YILDIRIMPUBLISHED MARCH 26, 2026

READING TIME 2 MINUTES

© Anna Barclay

 COMMENTS (2)

On Wednesday, Apple unveiled new device-level age restrictions in the UK. After downloading a new update, users will now have to confirm that they are 18 or older to access unrestricted features.

Users will be able to confirm their age with a credit card or by scanning an ID.

For those underage or who have not confirmed their age, Apple will turn on Web Content Filter and Communication Safety, which will not only restrict access to certain apps or websites, but will also monitor messages, shared photo albums, AirDrop, and FaceTime calls for nudity.

Apple didn’t specify exactly which services and features are banned for under-18 users, but it will likely be in compliance with UK legislation. Gizmodo reached out to the Cupertino giant for comment, and we’ll update this post when we receive a reply.

The British government does not require Apple and other OS providers to institute device-level age checks, but it does restrict minor access to online pornography under the Online Safety Act, which passed in 2023. So far, that restriction has only been implemented at the website level, but UK officials have been worried about easy loopholes to evade the age restrictions, like VPNs.

The broader tech industry has been campaigning for some time to use device-level age checks instead in response to the rising tide of under-16 social media and internet bans around the world.

Last month, in a landmark social media trial in California, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg also supported this idea, saying that conducting age verification “at the level of the phone is just a lot clearer than having every single app out there have to do this separately.”

Pornhub-operator Aylo had advocated for device-level restrictions in the UK as well, and even sent out letters to Apple, Google, and Microsoft in November asking for OS-level age verification. At the time, British authorities had responded to Aylo, saying that OS-level restrictions would have to be industry-led, as nothing was stopping these tech companies from implementing the method and showing evidence of its effectiveness.

The most obvious question: Could this be brought stateside?

Many states have already passed legislation restricting the activity of minors on the internet. Apple began working with Texas authorities late last year on the state’s new age restrictions that have since drawn legal backlash. Last month, the company announced that new users in Utah and Louisiana will have their age categories shared with the App Store starting this summer, to ensure compliance with the new age restriction laws in the states.

The regulatory momentum is only growing in the United States, and states are increasingly seeking device-level restrictions. California passed its Digital Age Assurance Act last year, and the law would require users to enter their date of birth when setting up a new phone or computer to ensure OS-level restrictions when it goes into effect next year.

Colorado is also seeking to follow in California’s footsteps. Earlier this year, state legislators introduced a device-level age restriction bill modeled after California’s.

Chelsea break English football record with £262.4m pre-tax loss for 2024-25 season

Chelsea break English football record with £262.4m pre-tax loss for 2024-25 season


The Guardian · an hour ago
by Agencies · Chelsea

Blues surpass Manchester City’s £197.5m loss in 2010-11

Club compliant with PSR rules for three years to 2024-25

Chelsea on Wednesday reported a pre-tax loss of £262.4m during the 2024-25 season, the biggest annual loss ever recorded in English football, surpassing the previous record loss of £197.5m posted by Manchester City in 2010-11.

The club posted a profit of £128.4m in the previous year’s accounts, boosted by the sale of the women’s team to Blueco Midco – a subsidiary company – for almost £200m. Chelsea said the losses were attributable in part to increased operating costs in 2024-25 compared to the previous year.Continue reading...

Tesla Goes Ahead and Admits Its Robotaxis Are Sometimes Fully Human-Controlled

Tesla Goes Ahead and Admits Its Robotaxis Are Sometimes Fully Human-Controlled

Waymo takes great pains to never describe its vehicles as giving up autonomy completely. Tesla doesn't seem to care.

BY MIKE PEARLPUBLISHED MARCH 31, 2026, 9:07 PM ET

READING TIME 3 MINUTES

Except it's not entirely robo. © Tim Goessman/Bloomberg via Getty Images

 COMMENTS (20)

Tesla robotaxis are not necessarily operating without a human in the loop, even its small number of unsupervised robotaxis that lack safety operators. If you’re a self-driving car fan, that reflects a deflating fact of life about the current state of autonomous vehicles: the companies operating them still don’t trust them on the roads without occasional button pushes from a flesh-and-blood human sitting at a desk somewhere.

But Tesla appears to be unique among its competitors when it comes to the extent to which its vehicles occasionally rely on humans. That is to say: they occasionally surrender control to them completely.

Karen Steakley, director of public policy and business development at Tesla, recently divulged this in a letter to Senator Ed Markey, a Democrat representing Massachusetts (as first reported by Wired). Human operators, Steakley wrote, “are authorized to temporarily assume direct vehicle control as the final escalation maneuver after all other available intervention actions have been exhausted.”

Competitors like Waymo say they allow humans to play a role in the operation of a vehicle on the road, but a more limited one, and they take great pains to make this distinction. Waymo’s description of what went wrong last year when its vehicles seemed to have a widespread meltdown during a blackout in San Francisco touched on this, for instance.

The issue involved a large number of Waymo vehicles encountering four-way stoplights that were blacked out, and sending an unmanageable number of confirmation requests to human workers with Waymo’s “fleet response” division, which we now know is largely based in the Philippines.

According to Waymo’s public relations materials online, rather than, say, “steering” the vehicle remotely, perhaps with a joystick, fleet response workers see camera feeds and 3D representations of the Waymo vehicle’s position within its environment and give feedback. They might simply have to click an answer to a question like Is the street I’m trying to turn onto closed? Or they might suggest a new course of action for getting out of a jam, like pulling into a driveway to let others pass.

They do this in a way that is a bit like telling a unit what to do in a real-time strategy video game, except Waymo insists that the “Waymo Driver”—the hardware and software system that drives the car—can refuse the human suggestion, meaning it never surrenders executive control.

Steakley makes it pretty clear that Tesla lacks Waymo’s compunctions about seizing the car’s autonomy entirely. Tesla employs “remote assistance operators” (RAOs) in Austin, Texas and Palo Alto, California in order to “promptly move a vehicle that may be in a compromising position,” she told Markey in the letter. A human might take “temporary control of the vehicle,” and remotely move it up to 10 miles-per-hour, she explained.

This only happens “if direct access is granted by the Tesla [automated driving system].” Though she also notes that if a rider requests help, they may end up communicating with a Tesla RAO “via bidirectional audio.”

RAOs must also, according to Steakley:

• have a “valid U.S. driver’s license for a minimum of 3 years”
• “maintain a license and clean driving record throughout their employment.”
• “undergo criminal background and Motor Vehicle Record checks”
• “pass a U.S. Department of Transportation drug test”

Markey issued a report Tuesday, after receiving similar letters in response to  questions about remote operation in these vehicles not just from Tesla and Waymo, but also five other competitors. Markey believes the responses reflect a “patchwork of safety practices across the industry, with significant variation in operator qualifications, response times, and overseas staffing, all without any federal standards governing these operations.”

Gizmodo reached out to Tesla and Waymo about these letters, and about Markey’s report. We will update this article if we hear back.

Vivaldi 7.9 for Mobile is a big one

 What's better than fantastic, usually comes 7 days after a Vivaldi desktop release and is likely to make you and your mobile smile? It’s a Vivaldi mobile release!

Vivaldi 7.9 for Mobile is a big one. iOS users finally get a signature Vivaldi feature Android fans have enjoyed for years, Two-Level Tab Stacks! Both Android and iOS get the daily image feature, to add some sparkle to your day. Android users also get a taste of Desktop Mode.

Let's dive into what's new:

iOS: Stack up, switch over, and make it yours

Two-Level Tab Stacks arrive on iOS

It's here. The feature Android users have been putting to work since 2021 has finally made its way to Vivaldi on iOS.

Two-Level Tab Stacks let you group your tabs and see them all at once, no more scrolling through an endless single row. Your stacks sit in the top row of the Tab Bar, and the tabs inside that stack appear in the row below. Open what you need, hide what you don't. The second row only appears when you're inside a stack, so things stay clean when you just want to browse.

If you've ever found yourself drowning in tabs (research, shopping, planning a trip, keeping up with news), you'll immediately get why this matters. You can keep everything open without losing your mind. Work tabs in one stack, weekend reading in another. Each group is tidy, accessible, and right there in your Tab Bar.

To get started, long-press the New Tab button and choose "New Tab Stack." You can choose between two styles of tab stacking: Two-Level or Accordion. To pick your style, go to Settings > Tabs > Tab Stacking Style.

No other mobile browser offers this. We built it for Android first, refined it based on your feedback over the years, and now it's yours on iOS too.

A new view, every day

The Daily Image has always been one of those small things that makes Vivaldi feel a little more alive. Every day, a new photograph appears on your Start Page, something beautiful, something unexpected, something worth a second look.

In Vivaldi 7.9 for iOS, you can take it one step further. There's now an option to use your Daily Image directly as your wallpaper. Your Start Page and your home screen, in perfect sync, both dressed in the same image, refreshed every day without any effort from you.

It's a small thing, but it makes your phone feel a bit more like yours.

You can enable Daily Image from the Start Page:

Tap the three dots or Customize button > Use Daily Image

or from Settings:

Settings > Start Page > Wallpaper > Use Daily Image

Import from Safari in seconds

Switching browsers shouldn't feel like starting from scratch. In Vivaldi 7.9 for iOS, it doesn't have to.

You can now import your browsing data directly from Safari. Bring your bookmarks, passwords, history, stored credit card info and more, right into Vivaldi. If Safari has been your default, everything you've built up there can come with you. It takes a mere moment, and you'll feel right at home.

To import from Safari, go to Settings and there you’ll find the option “Safari import".

If you've been curious about trying Vivaldi but held back because of the friction of moving over, that friction is now gone.

Android: A beautiful daily image and Desktop Mode improvements

Daily Image comes to Android

The Daily Image feature is now on Vivaldi for Android. Every day, a new photograph fills your Start Page, curated, beautiful, and a welcome change from the usual blank slate.

Your Start Page has always been the place where browsing begins. Now it's worth a proper look.

Put your mobile to work with DeX and Desktop Mode

We continue refining DeX and Desktop Mode support for Android power users. Browsing in Desktop Mode for your mobile device is already available as DEX on Samsung devices, while for Android it is still in Beta. We know many of you are eager to test what the experience will be like.

We are very excited about Desktop Mode on Android. It turns your phone into a desktop computer, when connected to a screen, keyboard and mouse. Our goal is to make that experience as powerful as possible, just as you’d expect from Vivaldi. And with the most powerful mobile browser available, we have a head start. Not only do you have real tabs, you have powerful tab management features, like Tab Stacks and Two-Level Tab Stacks. You also have panels for quick access to your Bookmarks, History, Notes, Translate and Downloads.

With 7.9, we are including further improvements to how Vivaldi behaves in these environments, steadily getting better as we work toward a more complete experience. More on that front is coming soon.

Vivaldi 7.9 for Mobile is available now. Update through the Play Store or App Store.

Download Vivaldi 7.9 for Android👇

Download Vivaldi 7.9 for iOS👇

As always, thank you for being part of the Vivaldi community. Together, we’re fighting for a better web, one release at a time.

Best
Team Vivaldi

Turned down $26m

 

Prime number: Turned down $26m

Lex 18

Joan of Arc. King Leonidas and the 300 Spartans. History is filled with figures who stood steadfast against a more powerful adversary. Now, you can add Northern Kentucky farmowner Ida Huddleston and her daughter, Delsia Bare, to that list. The pair rebuffed a $26 million offer from an anonymous AI company to buy part of their land for a proposed data center. According to WKRC, the company offered roughly 10x what land in the county is usually worth, but still, the farmers refused. “Stay and hold and feed a nation,” Bare said, adding that her family raised wheat through the Great Depression and that “$26 million doesn’t mean anything.” The company has reportedly revised its plan and could still build its data center nearby.