iPhone keyboard quietly refuses to suggest about 100,000 phrases, researcher finds

The iPhone keyboard carries a hidden list of words and phrases it will not suggest, researcher Derik Kauffman said on 6 November. He published the English list and those for other languages, decoded from Apple's own data files. Most entries are vulgar or about drugs, sex and violence, but the list also covers "NSA surveillance", "Tibetan independence" and "dictator Trump". Reuters tested a small sample on an iPhone and found it behaved as described.

Predictive text never offers a listed phrase, even when it is the obvious next word. Swipe typing usually won't produce it either, and the keyboard may pick another word or change one you already entered. In Reuters' test, swiping "United Ireland" often gave "United Iceland", "Sleepy Joe" gave "Sleepy hope" and "white man" gave "white mean", while "red man" went through. "Dictator Trump" could be swiped, with "trump" in lowercase, and autocomplete offered "dictator trumps" instead.

The rules match exact word sequences, so small changes get through. "Taiwan is country" is blocked and "Taiwan is a country" is not. The check runs locally on the device before a candidate is shown.

Read the full article on vpnlab.io: https://vpnlab.io/en/iphone-keyboard-hidden-list-100000-phrases-2026-3275