Apple is planning to install software that identifies child abuse images on all iOS devices.
Financial Times reported the company wants to release software called "neuralMatch" that searches photos stored on a user's smartphone and iCloud account, then sends any suspicious images to a team of reviewers.
The image will be examined by a human if it discovers a match. The user's account will be disabled and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) will be alerted if child pornography is discovered.
Because the program exclusively searches for images that are already in NCMEC's database, parents taking photos of their children in the bath, for example, do not appear to be at risk.
However, experts are concerned that the matching technology, which does not "see" images but only mathematical fingerprints that represent them, could be misused.
The system, according to Matthew Green, a prominent cryptography researcher at Johns Hopkins University, may be used to incriminate innocent people by sending them seemingly innocuous photographs tailored to trigger matches for child pornography.
This might deceive Apple's system and notify authorities.
For years, tech giants such as Microsoft, Google, and Facebook have shared digital fingerprints of known child sexual abuse photos. Apple has utilized them to search for images of child abuse in user files stored in its iCloud service.
However, the move to on-device scanning is unique among big tech.
Apple has already implemented a new set of digital controls in iMessage, iCloud, Siri, and Search. All of which, the company, claims are intended to prevent child abuse.
In family iCloud accounts, a new opt-in setting will utilize machine learning to detect nudity in photographs sent via iMessage. The system can also prevent certain photos from being transmitted or received, show warnings, and, in some situations, notify parents that their child viewed or sent them.
If Siri or Search detects that someone is searching for or viewing child sexual abuse materials, generally known as CSAM, it will now display a warning and provide choices to seek assistance for their behavior or report what they found.
The Cupertino-based tech giant was among the first major companies to implement "end-to-end" encryption, which scrambles data so that only the sender and recipient can read them.
Apple stated that the most recent changes will be made available this year as part of updates to its operating software for iPhones, Macs, and Apple Watches.
