What does Unrestricted Web Access mean in iTunes Connect

Question

When you are submitting your app to Apple app store, there is a section named "Rating" where you should rate your content based on the chart and identify how frequently the content appears.

There is one option called "Unrestricted web access" which there are no further details available about this on the Internet nor iTunes Connect Developer Guide. All you can find everywhere is:

Select Yes if your app allows users to navigate and view web pages, such as with an embedded browser.

What does this mean? Does this mean your app can open links in embedded or Safari browser? Or does this mean your app features a browser where users can enter URLs and navigate through the web unrestricted? Because saying yes to this question will make your app 17+!

If this means opening links from your app (Safari or embedded), how come other apps that have embedded browser capability have 4+ rating (like Twitter and Facebook)? As it can be seen in screenshots, there is no way to select this one and not be rated 17+

Update: My app was approved with embedded WebView (TOWebViewController) with the answer "No" (4+). As the answer mentions, any way you let users navigate through the internet such as dynamic address bar that means it should be "Yes" (17+) because it is not possible to do Parental Control on your WebView.

Update 2: Since the release of iOS 9, Apple has introduced SFSafariViewController which is a way of opening any URLs on the internet. This feature also has an address bar but read-only. So users can't surf the Web without parental control. It also inherits content blocking from Safari (ads, explicit content, etc.). I am highly positive by using SFSafariViewController in iOS 9 or above you still can choose 4+ as the device with parental control can't open any URLs anyway. (Let me know if I am wrong)

Update 3: Twitter now is 17+ based on the followings:

You must be at least 17 years old to download this application.

Infrequent/Mild Profanity or Crude Humor

Frequent/Intense Mature/Suggestive Themes

Infrequent/Mild Sexual Content and Nudity

Update 4: It is possible to use Twitter content inside your app without inheriting its rating (17+). My app is displaying Tweets, but since the users are verified and trusted public figures I could go down to 12+:

Infrequent/Mild Sexual Content and Nudity

Infrequent/Mild Profanity or Crude Humour

Infrequent/Mild Mature/Suggestive Themes

Selflove

"As it can be seen in screenshots, there is no way to select this one and not be rated 17+" If you have an existing app and neither Yes nor No is selected, it shows "4+". – Upsilon

@Upsilon Well of course if you don't have a Web browser inside your app or a way to access to the Web you are not suppose to choose either yes or no. The thing is what would you suppose to choose if you have an embedded Web View. Which turned out you say no if your browser doesn't have a dynamic address bar (4+). And yes if user can navigate from address bar(17+). – Selflove

If you try to submit the edit version info form, you have to choose Yes or No. It won't let you submit the form unless you choose something for each of those questions. It has nothing to do with what is in your app. But you don't need to submit the form unless you need to edit version info. – Upsilon

@Upsilon Mine was a new app not an update or edit. I thought you were talking about new app submissions. But old or new there is a new radio button here that you have to choose for new submissions and I wanted to know what it is because there is not enough information about it in that question mark in front of it. – Selflove

I wanted to share my experience here. I have an app that used to open a YouTube channel in a webview with an app rating of 4+. Apple rejected as it was "unfiltered access to YouTube". So, we used the SafariViewController and left the rating at 4+. Apple rejected for the same reason. I had a long discussion with them and they refused to budge. So, if you are trying to link to YT in a webview or SafariViewController then your only option is to filter the content in the app or open up the YT app which has content restrictions built in. – Lordling

@Lordling many thanks, this is very useful – Selflove

Interestingly enough, Apple rejected my argument that opening a YouTube channel via SafariViewController was good enough. They said that since it was still attached to my app then I would need to change the rating to 17+. If I opened Safari they might accept it as that was more detached from the app. We compromised and decided to just open the YouTube app if the user had it installed and show message otherwise. This got us down to a 12+ rating. – Lordling

Thanks @Lordling for the update :) – Selflove

Answer 1

It means that a user of the app can access any URL. The issue is parental controls. If the parent has restricted web access an app that allows unlimited access, that is access to any site the user chooses then the parental controls are subverted.

Once Apple provided parental controls that caused a ripple effect on the capabilities of apps and also required Apple to review all apps for parental control violations. It also means that alternate app stores could not be allowed, they could contain apps that did not properly honor parental controls. Hence:"The Walled Garden."

Squab

thanks for the response Zaph. So in this case apps like Twitter or Facebook that just allow user open URLs that's been shared on their networks (not by user's choice) do not need to select this option? – Selflove

That seems correct with the caveat that the on-network material and links meet the parental control age--so some monitoring is probably required. – Squab

You were right. If the WebView inside the app doesn't have a dynamic address bar (a way user can navigate through the internet) the answer is "No" (4+). My app was approved under the same situation. I even was asked to provide dynamic address bar which I said no I don't want to have 17+ app and let users navigate through the app. That wasn't the purpose of my app. So instead, I provided the option in settings for users to open the URLs outside the app if they don't want embedded browser. – Selflove

Answer 2

I think if you use default WebView control it is ok and you don't need to set Unrestricted web access to YES. My app has defaut WebView control with dynamic address bar and if i turn ON restrictions (limited websites access) embedded default WebView control does not display restricted content. It behaves the same as Safari app. So i would say you only need to set this to YES if your app has third party WebView control which can not be controlled by Apple.

TO CORRECT MY OWN ANSWER: sorry, but not true. If your app uses any kind of WebView (default or third party) with option to access any website you have to set Unrestricted Web Access to Yes otherwise your app will be Metadata Rejected. It just happend with my apps!

Wertheimer

I was about to tell you the same thing. You provide unrestricted access to internet from your app regardless of third-party webview or native webview or whatever, you have to say YES. – Selflove

Answer 3

If you provide an internal web browser or UIWebView which allows to the user access to any URL you have to select YES or your app will be Metadata Rejected.

Annetteannex

Answer 4

My app just got rejected because it has a link to the corresponding article on wikipedia. My guess is that because wikipedia allows you to search for other articles on wikipedia then it is considered "Unrestricted Web Access" and resulting 17+ app rating.

Kind of extreme in my opinion.

Inhesion

Answer 5

Hope, You have got your answer. Let me ADD some more specific question, I think it will help.

QUESTIONS :

• Does a link that opens in an external browser (like iOS Safari) constitute "Unrestricted Web Access?"
• Does an embedded browser in an app without a URL bar constitute "Unrestricted Web Access?"

ANSWER :

• If your app uses the embedded browser (which does not display a URL bar) and the link does not reference objectionable content, then you should not need to label it "Unrestricted Web Access."
• If your app calls up an external web browser (like iOS Safari) and the link does not reference objectionable content, then you should not need to label it "Unrestricted Web Access."

Apple has not specifically addressed these questions and leaves it to the review process to determine whether the rating is correct. Through my own investigation, I have observed the above.

Dissolution

Hi thanks, I have a question. What if users are free to write url links and users can access them? – Ahoy

@rounpaleum in that case, you should select 'Yes' for unrestricted web access – Dissolution

Answer 6

I use the Ionic/Cordova In-App browser plugin and no issues here with that. i.e. user cannot change the URL of it. So the answer here is NO

https://ionicframework.com/docs/native/in-app-browser

Dunker