ADVERTISEMENT

Trump's iPhone doesn't have a web browser (AAPL)

The presidential iPhone isn't configured like most people's phones.

Trump's phone doesn't even have a web browser on it, the New York Times reported on Friday:

Mr. Kelly cannot stop Mr. Trump from binge-watching Fox News, which aides describe as the president’s primary source of information gathering. But Mr. Trump does not have a web browser on his phone, and does not use a laptop, so he was dependent on aides like Stephen K. Bannon, his former chief strategist, to hand-deliver printouts of articles from conservative media outlets.

Earlier this year, White House officials said that Trump had started using an iPhone, a change from his previous Samsung Galaxy S3.

But the presidential iPhone isn't configured like most people's phones. In fact, it only has one app on it: Twitter, according to Axios.

ADVERTISEMENT

You may be wondering how you could configure your phone like Trump's. You can't delete the Safari web browser app like most apps, by holding down on it until it wiggles and clicking the "x" on its upper-left corner.

It turns out that it's fairly straightforward to turn an iPhone into a limited device: You can add restrictions to your phone in Settings > General > Restrictions.

It will ask you to enter a passcode, because the intended use of the feature is for parents and IT managers.

After that, you can turn off the Safari, Camera, FaceTime apps, which will hide their icons and prevent them from launching. You can also turn off Siri, AirDrop, and CarPlay. After that, you can uninstall all other apps and you have a phone that only sends tweets.

Trump's iPhone could be configured remotely by a White House staffer through software called MDM, Apple blogger and podcaster John Gruber wrote on Sunday.

ADVERTISEMENT

Aside from Trump's lack of familiarity with computers, the most likely reason for the restriction is security — the president's phone is a target for hackers around the world, so it needs to be completely locked-down to make it harder to hack.

"This is a great phone, state of the art, but it doesn't take pictures, you can't text, the phone doesn't work, and you can't play your music on it,” President Barack Obama joked last year.

JOIN OUR PULSE COMMUNITY!

Unblock notifications in browser settings.
ADVERTISEMENT

Eyewitness? Submit your stories now via social or:

Email: eyewitness@pulse.com.gh

ADVERTISEMENT