Apple's hidden keyboard list restricts 'dictator Trump,' 'Sleepy Joe' and thousands of other phrases
Apple maintains an undisclosed list of roughly 100,000 words and phrases that its iPhone keyboard generally avoids suggesting through predictive text or entering through swipe-typing, according to a researcher whose findings were independently checked by Reuters.
The list includes politically charged phrases such as "dictator Trump," "Sleepy Joe," "Tibetan independence" and "United Ireland," Reuters reported on November 6.
The restrictions do not prevent users from typing the words manually. Instead, they affect the keyboard's autocomplete suggestions and its swipe-typing feature, which allows users to enter text by sliding a finger across the keys.
Independent researcher Derik Kauffman, founder of the startup Blacklight, discovered the list after noticing that his iPhone struggled to swipe-type phrases such as "bad boy" and "white man," while accepting similar combinations including "bad girl" and "black man."
Using AI-assisted coding tools, Kauffman traced the behavior to a multilingual list embedded in Apple's operating system. He estimated that it contains around 100,000 words and phrases, excluding Chinese characters, although the total depends on how variations are counted.
Most entries concern profanity, drugs, sex or violence. But the list also contains political expressions and place names, raising questions about how Apple decides which language its devices should suggest.
Reuters tested a sample of the phrases and reproduced the behavior. Swipe-typing "Sleepy Joe" produced "Sleepy hope," while "United Ireland" often became "United Iceland." The keyboard could enter "dictator Trump" through swiping, but did not suggest the phrase through autocomplete.
The restrictions also extend beyond English. According to Kauffman, the French keyboard would not swipe-type a phrase meaning "immigration too high," while the Hebrew keyboard restricted the phrase "occupied territories."
Cybersecurity engineer Matt Suiche independently recovered the same list and reported a near-perfect match with Kauffman's findings.
Apple did not directly address the size or contents of the list or explain why particular political phrases were included. The company told Reuters that users could always type their preferred words manually or override suggestions, and said its keyboard was designed to avoid suggestions that might be inappropriate or offensive.
Kauffman described the system as a "very light-touch form of censorship," arguing that even small changes to text suggestions could have a broad effect given the number of iPhone users worldwide.
David Greene, senior counsel at the digital rights organization Electronic Frontier Foundation, said such restrictions might help prevent offensive suggestions but argued that users should know about them and have some control over how they work.
"This is something that should not be secret," Greene told Reuters.