This article is more than 1 year old

Apple grapples with wave of filth

Underage smut on the iPhone? Surely not

Apple has again been caught out by an app that delivers content from outside Cupertino's control - this time it's naked pics of girls puportedly as young as 15 using a social networking application.

The app concerned, BeautyMeter, is one of the familiar hot-or-not style applications, where users can upload their own pictures which are rated by other users, except this one quickly filled with naked shots of girls with claimed ages well below the commonly-accepted age of consent.

The application was spotted by the Krapps site, which provides a selection of probably-not-safe-for-work examples, and has since been pulled from the iTunes application store. However, other applications from the same publisher (Braun Software) remain available - unlike when the developer of Hottest Girls had all his applications pulled by way of punishment for showing naked (female) breasts.

But the situations aren't quite the same - Hottest Girls was served with images selected by the publisher, while BeautyMeter serves user-generated content from which the publisher seeks to distance itself:

"We don't review each uploaded photo exclusively but from time to time we will clean up. You can mark a photo as spam so the community is able to regulate among themselves material that they don't like."

The problem, of course, was that the community rather liked the naked shots - and it's only when Krapps reported it that Apple noticed. The lads in Cupertino can hardly be held responsible for everything displayed though an iPhone application - the problem is that Apple wants to be responsible, and is thus forever playing catch-up with the apps that slip through the net. ®

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like