I’ve been around the world of tech and I’m also old enough to say that there isn’t too much that I think is that exciting when it comes to product news and announcements. Especially when it comes to smartphones – we’ve reached peak design and technology, perhaps other than AI. But let me tell you, the HMD Fuse is a smartphone for kids that features technology I have simply never seen before – it’s remarkable.

The HMD Fuse is designed for kids, but has parents in mind at every step of the way. Using a technology called HarmBlock+ this phone can be remotely controlled by the parent’s own smartphone.

And let me put this up front, Mum or Dad don’t have to have a HMD – they can have a Samsung, Motorola, Oppo or Apple iPhone. The parent just needs to install the Harmblock app and link to the HMD Fuse in the setup process.

Once linked, the parent has amazing controls at their fingertips – some of which you might think you can just do with an app on any other smartphone, but in most cases this is deeper because it’s built into the operating system.

“We believe this will be the most impactful smartphone launch of the year. “We’ve created not just a new phone, but a new category, one that recognises children’s evolving needs, and puts safety at the heart of the experience from day one,” said James Robinson, Vice President, HMD Family.

“When you give your child a smartphone, you bring a stranger and unknown dangers into your home. You can’t always watch them online, but now you have peace of mind that there’s protection in place even when you can’t be there, all while keeping their privacy in place. That’s why we believe this is a huge step forward in making a safer phone.”

“This is the first step in rewriting the rulebook on family tech.  We’re not just giving kids access to technology; we’re teaching them how to navigate it safely. This is more than a product. It’s a safety net, a statement of intent, and a response, because no child should be put in danger because of their device, and no parent should have to choose between connection and protection.”

Critically, this isn’t something the kids can muck around with, “This is a line in the sand. HarmBlock+ can’t be removed, tricked, or worked around. It doesn’t collect personal data. It just protects every time, across every app, including VPNs, with zero loopholes,” said Richard Pursey, Founder of SafeToNet.

“We are seeing a rise in peer-to-peer online abuse and child exploitation. This is the first and only AI to stop that. In essence, we have made the HMD Fuse pornography incompatible.”

Whitelisting calls on the HMD Fuse

Give your kids a smartphone and one risk is that random people can call them, or they can call anyone. Learning who to call and who you’re allowed to call should be part of learning to live in a digital age.

On the parent device, you simply add a new contact with a name and number. Within moments, via the internet (you don’t have to be in the same room as your child to make these changes), that contact will appear on the phone.

Boom – the child can now call that number!

Try calling another number – blocked.

If another random non contact tries to call your child – it will just go through to voicemail, they won’t get your child.

The same blacklist works for SMS too. However, in my few days testing, I did discover that if you remove a whitelisted contact, that contact can still be send an SMS. I haven’t had enough phones to work out why, but it may be because it was an RCS message thread initiated, but – either way, its a minor thing.

Controlling which apps your kids can see and use with HarmBlock+

You can happily leave the Google Play store on the phone. Kids can download apps.

But as soon as they install – they are blocked.

On the parent phone, there’s a Hide Apps feature. A long list of all the apps that have been installed. The parent can simply tick an app to allow it.

And boom – the app appears in seconds.

App privileges can be revoked too – at any time. It. Just. Works.

Screen time and downtime for kids

There’s a few settings relating to time on the HMD Fuse also. Now, of course Apple and Google have great screen time controls, this doesn’t do it any much better, but because it’s part of such a strong suite of overall controls.

School Time is one setting of it’s own that sets rules and functions off during school hours, while Bed Time sets the time it should stop working at night and work again in the morning.

And at a glance the parents can see how long the kids have been on the screen each day.

Nice, simple, easy.

Location tracking on the HMD Fuse

Likewise, a feature that parents love is tracking. Don’t come at me over privacy – if you do it right, kids will love the freedom they get when mum or dad know where they are.

It’s simple, its again integrated into a single app for all these things, and shows history of location too.

For me it’s not a patch on Life360 and I’d personally recommend that for all families, mainly because it can allow kids to see where mum and dad are, and I think that helps with the trust factor of “why” we’re seeing your location.

How does the HMD Fuse stop kids looking at porn or taking nude selfies?

THIS. This is the best feature, the most amazing feature.

The HMD Fuse is able to essentially “see” what’s on the screen. And it’s entirely on the lookout for nudity. I’ve been able to get it to work with a skimpy bikini photo, which helps for testing this in a public setting to be honest.

Nudity checks happen in apps, and on the camera.

So, if little Johnny has curiosity and does a Google search for naked ladies, that will work. But if he switches to Google Images, he’ll get a very quick look at what he’s after – perhaps one, maybe two seconds, and then a big purple screen will pop up blocking his vision of these images.

There’s a button on the screen, pressing that is basically a back button and you can get back to your search.

But it also works on the Camera. Open the camera and try to take a photo of yourself, or someone else naked or semi-naked and the camera. The screen goes black with a “no photo” icon on the screen.

AND, this works in-app too – so try it with TikTok or Snapchat, no go.

Now, because it takes a second for the phone to work out it’s seeing nudity, so it is possible in that instant to take a photo – but in my testing, I was able to do it, at such speed that I can’t imagine it would be too easy to get a focus and great shot in that instant.

So this photo was on the phone after I took it in that instant, as a file in the photos app. But every time I went to look at it, I was blocked. Only by connecting the phone to a PC could i get the image off.

So is it perfect? No, but by gosh, its the closest thing I’ve ever seen to stopping this happening.

But here’s how tightly integrated it is with the operating system. I had a 2 minute video and on my computer i edited it. I found explicit nude photos and put them on one frame of the video – that’s 1/25th of a second in a two minute video.

I moved that video file onto the phone’s internal storage via USB. Within a minute the phone deleted that video.

Same would apply to an explicit image sent in a messaging app and saved to the phone. Gone.

That’s awesome.

Fun Flashy Case with a Selfie light!

In the box is a simple kinda plastic case for the phone. That’s a win.

But get this, there’s a second case, called the HMD Fusion Flashy Outfit. This case has an LED light around the camera lenses.

That light can be twisted up on a hinge and work on the front-facing camera too. Integrated into the camera app are the controls for how the light works.

Quite unique.

And it works ok too – here’s a crappy selfie with and without that Flashy light.

The HMD Fuse smartphone grows with your child

Bottom line, you could give this to an 8 year old and enable no apps, and only your own phone number for them to call.

Then as they age, you can add apps, allow use of the camera, let them onto the internet on Chrome.

When they are 13, maybe 14 you might open it all up and let them go, it’s all up to you.

A remarkable execution of a great idea.

Can kids bypass the HMD Fuse parental controls?

I’ve told you what I’ve discovered, and it’s not much. The app can’t be deleted, it’s buried in the operating system.

Thinking out loud, I reckon the only thing they could do is perform a “root” install on the phone, which is to basically remove android and install a new version. Is that possible? No idea. Would a parent notice – yeah, because the HarmBlock app would no longer show the phone’s location, details or battery – so unless the parent switches off from actually parenting, that child is going to lose that phone and be grounded pretty quick.

How could the HMD Fuse be better for parents?

I’d love to see notifications of blocked content.

As a parent, I don’t want to know what my child was googling that it was blocked, or what site they went to – but just like the screen time graph, perhaps let’s put in some stats on how often things are being blocked?

Just an idea.

Where can you buy the HMD Fuse

Harvey Norman and Officeworks are selling this from August 28 for $799.

Harmblock+ is included for 12 months, and will cost $26.95 after that, but hey, they’re aren’t young forever, so that’s at least one subscription that you know you’ll cancel in a few years.