With the releases of iOS 16 and macOS Ventura in 2022, Apple debuted its Lockdown Mode for folks at specific threat of being focused by mercenary adware. The function is basically a set of configurations for iOS and macOS that restrict or block niceties like hyperlink previews in Messages and shared albums in Photos. Lockdown Mode additionally restricts your gadget’s capacity to just accept unsolicited communications like FaceTime calls from cellphone numbers and accounts you have by no means known as earlier than. And this yr, in iOS 17, Apple added extra enhancements, that means extra safety-focused limitations. The firm has persistently emphasised that Lockdown Mode shouldn’t be meant for mainstream use by most individuals—however in per week of testing, it is surprisingly tolerable.

Turning on Lockdown Mode merely entails confirming the setting change along with your gadget PIN or a biometric authentication in “Privacy & Security” after which rebooting so the system can apply all of the restrictions and limitations. Enabling Lockdown Mode is just like altering the language of your gadget—the system must comprehensively undertake the brand new configuration and apply it in every single place. Once the reboot is full, your gadget comes again on wanting just about like regular.

When malware builders goal Apple gadgets, they tailor their assaults to take advantage of weaknesses within the advanced options of iOS and macOS that facilitate communication and information sharing and deal with totally different file sorts and data codecs. So Lockdown Mode goals to make it a lot tougher for business adware distributors or different motivated and well-resourced actors to develop exploit chains that mix vulnerabilities in a number of iOS or macOS options to take management of gadgets. In apply, which means it is tougher and fewer enjoyable to casually share—and particularly obtain—hyperlinks, GIFs, and built-in parts in instruments like Messages. And providers like HomeKit are curtailed as effectively.

For instance, you’ll be able to nonetheless use Apple Pay with Lockdown Mode, however its integrations with different apps are a lot much less fluid. If somebody sends you a cost by Apple Cash, you’ll be able to obtain it, however you will solely get a really common, unspecific message in Messages that one thing has occurred— you will not know that somebody despatched you cash on Apple Cash. Links do not broaden once you ship and obtain them, and should you ship or obtain a hyperlink to a picture or different file, it would ship as text-only—a gnarly, full URL with no preview and no hyperlink that might allow you to robotically open it in a browser.

As a part of Apple’s most up-to-date updates for Lockdown Mode in June, the corporate added help for Apple Watch and started robotically eradicating geolocation information from pictures once you share them. The enhancements additionally embody a transfer to dam gadgets by default from becoming a member of unsecured Wi-Fi networks and 2G mobile networks—a change meant to guard in opposition to malicious Wi-Fi networks and the cell information surveillance instrument often known as stingrays.

This set of updates enabled “safer wireless connectivity defaults, media handling, media sharing defaults, sandboxing, and network security optimizations,” Apple stated in a press release on the time. “Turning on Lockdown Mode further hardens device defenses and strictly limits certain functionalities, sharply reducing the attack surface for those who need additional protections.”