A two-year-old in China locked an iPhone for the equivalent of 47 years after entering the wrong passcode repeatedly. To be able to use the iPhone again, the mother would either have to wait the long amount of time or just wipe the phone.
This incident happened back in January.
Wrong Passcode
A two-year-old boy in Shanghai was responsible for locking his mother's iPhone for 47 years. Just pressing the screen caused the passcode screen to appear and he entered it wrong for a while.
His mother, called Lu in the story, says that when she returned to their home, the phone displayed the message saying that it was disabled for 25 million minutes. This could only be possible by repeatedly entering the wrong passcode.
She was told at an Apple store that she could either wait it out for the number of years it says on the phone or just factory reset the phone to be able to use it again. A technician for the Apple store told the South China Morning Post that this isn't the first time that he has seen this, a previous case he worked on had the iPhone locked for over 80 years.
"I couldn't really wait for 47 years and tell my grandchild it was your father's mistake," said Lu about the iPhone.
This started a debate in China about when it is acceptable to give children mobile devices.
Screen Time For Children
Given the rapid change of the way that media is consumed in the last two decades, doctors have had to change their guidelines for the amount of acceptable screen time for children. Previous recommendations had a limit of no more than two hours in front of the television for children over the age of 2.
New guidelines had to be written by the American Academy of Pediatrics to outline this shift. The new guidelines identify screen time as time spent using various devices for entertainment purposes. Using devices for homework doesn't count towards screen time.
Its new recommendation became one hour of screen time per day for children age 2 to 5. Children over 6 would have to use devices at their parent's discretion. For the youngest children, infants 18 months and younger, it was recommended that they shouldn't get exposed to digital media.
Banning digital media from the lives of young children is important for brain development and connections between the parent and child. Neglecting attention away from children can be detrimental to their development.
