Apple admits that a Screen Time bug is allowing kids to use their iPhones without time restrictions

A bug in Apple's Screen Time parental controls, as noted by The Wall Street Journal, is allowing kids to bypass the daily time restrictions that their parents set on their iPhone handsets. That means these youngsters can play games and interact with social media for more hours in the day than their parents think is healthy. The problem is that when parents are setting time restrictions for their kids, the changes are not being picked up by Screen Time.

Apple freely admits that there is a problem and a spokeswoman said, "We are aware that some users may be experiencing an issue where Screen Time settings are unexpectedly reset. We take these reports very seriously and we have been, and will continue, making updates to improve the situation." Screen Time, which is found in an iPhone's Settings menu, measures how long someone uses their iPhone every day and will send out weekly notifications that tell you whether your iPhone usage has risen or declined.

The feature was added in 2018 with the release of iOS 12 during a period when concern about smartphone addiction was prevalent. After setting up Screen Time for the family, a parent can limit the content his children can see on their iPhone devices, who they can communicate with via calls, FaceTime, or messages. The parent can also choose which apps his/her kid can use and for how many hours in a day.

With the aforementioned bug, parents are looking up the schedule they've set for their children in the Downtime tool in Screen Time only to find that it has reverted back to a previously used schedule or that there are no restrictions listed at all. And since your typical mobile-savvy child can easily tell when he/she is getting extra time to use his/her device and doesn't want the restriction to reappear, parents shouldn't expect to be alerted about this issue from their children.

Some parents figured out that something was up when they stopped receiving requests from their kids for additional usage time. Those that opened Downtime discovered that the time restrictions they set were not listed on the screen. The Journal counted more than 2,300 posts about this issue on the Apple Community website. The author of one post claims to have been in touch with Apple and allegedly was given this workaround:

Turn off screen time for the device that is needing to be blocked for downtime (child's device).
Make sure all pictures have synced with iCloud or they will be lost (scroll to the bottom of the photos app to check if any are pending) sign out of iCloud on all devices that can either approve screen time requests or have screen time limitations (child and parents).

Reset the same devices (not erase content, just reset all settings by going to Settings > General > Transfer or Reset iPhone > Reset > Reset All Settings).
Sign back into iCloud on all devices.
Turn screen time back on and set downtime limits.

If this doesn't work, or you want to wait for Apple to issue a fix, the good news is that Apple is aware of the problem which is a big one for many parents who fear that their kids will get addicted to their mobile screens. And this is not a new issue with Screen Time. On the Apple Community site, one parent with the username Drmorin wrote in December that the problem had started last October.

The message reads, "This issue started about two months ago. I have updated iOS on all the devices. I have turned screen time off and set up settings again. I have tried setting the limits from my device as well as the individual devices. My kids will spend too much time on their phones without limitations in place and creates repeated bouts of anger for my wife. Please help!"

And now that Apple has spoken freely about the bug, we could see it exterminated soon.