Apple was a role model for LGBTQ people — until it wasn’t

Apple shaped how entire generations thought about technology. For many of us, its products are a symbol of creativity and progress. The company taught us to “think different” and to believe that technology could make life better. But today, Apple’s actions tell a different story – when ethics collide with revenue, Apple backs down.

In 2014, Tim Cook came out as gay and presented it as gay Ethical stance. Apple wraps itself in Pride flags, markets inclusion and sells us the idea that it stands for something Bigger than profit. It appears that the company is accepting the fact that Apple is first fortune 500 A company with an openly gay CEO. Tim Cook has also written an article bloomberg business He said he was “proud to be gay.”

Fast forward to now, when Apple quietly taken out China’s two largest gay dating apps, Blued and Finka, were banned at the request of Beijing. not a statement. No defense for gay communities. Just silent compliance.

Recommended deals for you

Apple iPad Air M3 Chip 128GB Wi-Fi 6E 11″ Tablet (2025 Release)

,
$499.99

(List Price $599.00)

Dell 14 Premium Intel Ultra 7 512GB SSD 16GB RAM 2K Laptop

,
$999.99

(List price $1549.99)

Sony WH-1000XM5 Wireless Noise Canceling Headphones

,
$248.00

(List price $399.99)

WD 6TB My Passport USB 3.0 Portable External Hard Drive

,
$139.99

(List price $179.99)

Samsung Galaxy Tab A9+ 64GB Wi-Fi 11″ Tablet

,
$149.99

(List price $219.99)

Apple Watch Series 11 (GPS, 46mm, M/L Black Sport Band)

,
$359.99

(List Price $429.00)

Products are available for purchase through affiliate links. If you buy something through links on our site, Mashable may earn an affiliate commission.

This is not an isolated decision. This is a pattern.

When ethics collide with revenue

Apple’s support for marginalized communities appears to be collapsing under the pressure. Have child sexual abuse material (CSAM). In 2021, Apple acknowledged that verified images and videos of child sexual abuse were stored on iCloud. Because they knew this was a problem, they developed a privacy-preserving, independently-expert-vetted detection system to prevent it. They proudly announced Their plan was halted in August 2021 and then the roll out 30 days later.

Apple hired its own cryptography experts to verify the system’s secure confidentiality. Independent reviewers like David Forsyth And benny pincus Agreed: No innocent user data will be exposed. Yet Apple abandoned the plan after backlash over privacy concerns, backtracking on arguments it had already made.

Apple’s pivot to services like iCloud has made subscriptions a main revenue driver, generating approximately 100 billion dollars annually With gross margins around 75 percent. Despite this profitability, Apple still has not implemented any meaningful solutions to prevent the spread of known CSAM, leaving iCloud as one of the Some major cloud platforms that do not actively detect known CSAM. This failure has caused a stir lawsuits Thousands of survivors argue that Apple’s decision enables predators to pay for the storage of abuse images, allowing them to effectively monetize their trauma. On the contrary, companies prefer Google Deploy industry-standard security measures, combining hash-matching against the NCMEC database and AI to detect and report CSAM at scale. Apple’s refusal to implement similar measures highlights a difference: While profiting from cloud services, it has not ensured that these services are free from exploits.

Mashable Trend Report

This is not just complacency. This is negligence.

Morality should not be optional

It’s easy to do the right thing when it sells. Pride campaigns drive revenue, but only when the White House lights up in rainbow lights or consumer trends value ethics. But standing up for gay communities in China when the government is challenging you to stand up to oppression? It is difficult. Are you dealing with child exploitation on your platform? This is risky. Apple will remove LGBTQ+ apps without a fight to appease Beijing, but won’t take decisive action against child predators.

Apple no longer “thinks different”. It thinks profit. And unless we demand better, it will continue to choose power over the people.

what needs to change

Apple has the resources and expertise to lead on both fronts – protecting vulnerable communities and protecting children online. It can apply proven, privacy-conscious CSAM detection tools developed by experts at Thorne, NCMEC and the Johns Hopkins Moore Center. It can take a public stance against the censorship that erases LGBTQ+ lives. Instead, it has chosen silence and inaction.

Regulators, investors, and consumers must hold Apple accountable. Tech companies should not be allowed to profit from losses by hiding behind branding campaigns. Ethics cannot be optional in the digital age.

---

This article reflects the opinions of the authors.

Lennon Torres is a Public Voices Fellow on Child Sexual Exploitation Prevention with the OPED Project. She is an LGBTQ+ advocate who grew up in the public eye, gaining national recognition as a young dancer on television shows. With a deep passion for storytelling, advocacy and politics, Lennon now works to center her own and others’ lived experiences as she pursues a professional career in online child protection. summer initiativeThe opinions reflected in this piece are those of Lennon Torres as an individual, and not of the organizations he is a part of, Lennon’s Substack: https://substack.com/@lennontorres

Sarah Gardner is its Founder and CEO summer initiativeWith over 13 years of technical and policy expertise in online child protection, she is an internationally recognized voice advocating for the rights of children and survivors of child sexual exploitation, The HEAT Initiative is an organization of technology experts, parents, survivors, and advocates who strongly believe that tech companies like Apple and Meta need to remove CSAM from their platforms and implement policies that keep children safe online,