Apple’s iOS 15.5 is set to include a new feature to help keep ‘Sensitive Locations’ out of the memories served up by the Photos app.
The tool, which has appeared in the latest iPhone beta update due in a few weeks, looks as if it’s designed to prevent users being reminded of less joyous places they’ve visited.
Certainly the locations, spied within the beta by 9to5Mac, are solemn places where a jovial collection accompanied by a typically quirky soundtrack would be very much out of place.
Any photos or videos taken at these locations, made possible via a GPS ring-fence of the areas, will automatically be disqualified from Memories collections. The report says each location has latitude, longitude and radius tags to make sure.
The areas listed include historic sites like the Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps, the Schindler Factory and the US Holocaust Museum. It’s not clear whether Apple plans on broadening the scope of the Sensitive Locations before iOS 15.5 arrives in the next few weeks.
Apple already makes it possible to remove people from those Memories, which is a way to ensure you’re not reminded of painful relationships. When you get a memory featuring a certain person, you can tap the three dots menu and tap ‘Feature This Person Less’ or ‘Never Feature This Person’ to keep them out of memories altogether.
Apple also offers options for ‘Feature This Day Less’, and ‘Feature This Place Less’ as part of memories, but the new feature is more proactive.
iOS 15.5 is due in the next few weeks and will include request and send buttons in Apple Cash, new Wi-Fi signal bars for the HomePod in the Home app. It could also include the new iMessage child safety features for UK users.
Perhaps Apple could intelligently block out destinations that are guaranteed to make people sad too? They could ring-fence the entire Old Trafford stadium area for Man United fans, for example. Or it could at least give those beleaguered fans the opportunity to do so without being hit with the altogether bad Memories first.
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Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
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