Someone you love is gambling. What you can do

After that you answer when they ask to end protection or to end a Lockdown sooner, and when they ask to pass the key to someone else.

Saying no is one tap, from anywhere, in your own app, and your phone confirms it is you before the tap counts. If you say no they are told, with no reason attached, and the request closes there. A denial is a denial, and there is nowhere to write a reason. They can ask again 48 hours later, which opens a new request rather than reopening the one you closed.

• Letting them out is only ever done in person. Your app shows an approval code and they scan it with theirs while the two of you are standing together; no web page and no email can do it for you. Even then nothing opens that day: a wait of 48 hours starts from the moment you said yes.
• Doing nothing is a decision too, and it is the one that keeps protection on. If seven days pass with no answer the request closes on its own, and nothing about their protection changes. Silence is not a yes. Both answers stay open for the whole of those seven days, and an unanswered request leaves them waiting a week to be told nothing.

At the end of the wait the server marks a release that they still have to take. Nothing opens by itself, and a release nobody turns closes again after seven days, with their protection carrying on.

What reaches you

Their protection shows on the card you hold for them in your own app, and the card changes with it.

1. Protection went off. Screen Time permission was switched off on that phone, or the shield Fold’em applied is gone. Your card changes to Protection off.
2. The phone stopped confirming. No reading of any kind arrived for 24 hours. Your card reads Not confirmed yet, which can be as ordinary as a dead battery or airplane mode.
3. Protection is ending. Your card reads Protection at risk.

Which kinds of alert also ring your phone is yours to set in your own Settings, and a request to end protection always reaches you whatever those switches say.

The full account of what reaches you sets every word on the card out side by side.

What you can see, and what you never see

A keyholder is shown eleven things, and that list is written out in full on two help pages and in the privacy policy; every other page points at it. Read it before you accept: what a keyholder can see, and the same list from their side at what my keyholder sees.

The shape of it is status, counts, dates and event kinds. You never see which apps or sites were involved, anything they browse, any amount of money, or anything they typed except a note they add when they ask you, as their keyholder, to end a Lockdown sooner. There is no spend figure anywhere in what the server sends a supporter, so there is nothing for a screen to show you by accident.

That is deliberate, and it is the reason a person is willing to name you. A tool that reported their browsing to you would be a monitoring tool, and nobody hands the key to one of those.

What none of this reaches

Fold’em holds one iPhone. A second phone, a laptop, a betting shop and cash are all outside it, and none of them produces an event you would see. A calm card means the blocks on one phone are running; reading it as evidence about a person is the fastest way to turn a support into a surveillance argument.

It is also not treatment. Fold’em is a commitment device: it moves a decision to a calmer moment and, when someone holds the key, puts a second person in the loop. The organisations at the top of this page do the other work, and they should be your first call rather than your last.

Can I block gambling apps on someone else's iPhone?

Not on another adult's phone, and not through us. The block runs on Apple's Screen Time controls, and only the person sitting at that handset, signed in on it, can grant an app permission to use them; there is no remote install and no plan that seals another adult's apps. A child's phone is a different question with Apple's own answer rather than ours: Apple's page on Family Sharing says it lets you manage a child's device with Screen Time and parental controls, and that Where legally required, an Apple Account created for a child under 18 needs to be part of a Family Sharing group. If the phone belongs to a child, that is the route, and the page for parents says so instead of selling you an app that does not fit. Source: Apple on Family Sharing, read 3 September 2026.

Will I be told if they turn the block off?

Yes, on the card you hold for them in your own app: it changes when Screen Time permission goes off or the shield disappears, when 24 hours pass with no reading of any kind from the phone, and when protection is ending. The full account of what reaches you sets every word on the card out side by side.

What can I actually see about them?

Status, counts, dates and the kinds of events, and never a website, an app, an amount of money or anything they typed, except a note they add when they ask you, as their keyholder, to end a Lockdown sooner. The list is written out in full at what a keyholder can see, and it is worth reading before you accept rather than after. The shape matters more than any single item on it. A tool that reported somebody's browsing to the person worried about them would be a monitoring tool, and nobody hands the key to one of those.

Could I set it up on their phone without telling them?

No, and it would not survive the morning even if you could. Screen Time permission is granted by the person at the phone and withdrawn by them in iOS Settings whenever they like, so a block placed behind somebody's back lasts exactly as long as it takes them to find it. What lasts is the other shape. They install it, they choose what to seal, and they name you, and being named is what makes ending protection cost a conversation. How to ask them is the page for the part that is actually hard.

Where to go from here

By who you are: a partner, or a parent, or somebody worried about their own parent. By what you are working out: how to ask, and what happens the day they ask for the key back. And if they are ready to read something themselves, a page to send them, with a paragraph you can paste into a message.