Apple's iMessage platform has been subject of a new bug that shuts down your entire iPhone after receiving a particular message.
The message, whose second half is in Arabic, can send your phone into a reboot no matter what task it is performing -- it's proved very frustrating for some users and it's not certain what the long term effects are. Here's the fix: head into your Settings app, then the Notifications tab, Messages and then switch off the slider called "show on local screen and under "alert style when unlocked" choose "none". It's a pretty simple fix but it means if you're sent any more pesky iMessages you're not going to be sent into the reboot again. This is the text of the message Over and over A bug that means a specific string of text can completely crash iPhones has led people to take extreme measures to keep their phones safe. A problem with the way that iOS handles notifications means that if people are sent the code -- which includes strange words and unusual symbols and Arabic characters -- their phone grinds to a halt and restarts itself, before becoming unuseable. Apple has said that it is aware of the problem and is working on a fix, but until then users have been forced to take the problem into their own hands. The most dramatic way of avoiding the problem is to turn off notifications entirely for the Messages app. That is done by heading to Settings and choosing Notifications and then Messages, and swiping the toggle button so that "Show on Lock Screen" is off and the alert style when unlocked is set to "none". Messages will still show up in the notification centre and as a small badge on the app on the home screen, but won't be able to load up as banners and shut down the phone. The problem also seems to hit the Apple Watch. Turning off notifications in the same way seems to remedy that. An easier and less dramatic way of avoiding some of the chance of it happening is to filter out unknown senders. That can be done from the Messages options in the Settings app. Turning that setting on means that if a stranger sends a text, it is sent into its own conversation and doesn't bring up an alert. That means that people who aren't in your contact book won't be able to make the bug happen -- you'll still get alerts from your friends, for better or for worse. If the problem has already happened, it can be got around by either sending a message to the person who you received the problem one from, or sending yourself a text. But since the Messages app is broken by the bug, users have to take a roundabout route to do either. You can either ask Siri to send a text, or do so from the share sheets that can be found in most apps, such as Photos. It doesn't matter what's said in the text, as long as it's sent to yourself or the offending "effective power" message sender. Once that's done, the Messages app should come back to life and you can head in and delete the conversation. Apple has said that it is aware of the problem and is working on a fix. Hundreds of forum users are reporting the issue. JoeyTheBoey on Reddit said, "I have an un jailbroken iPhone 6 and it resprings my phone, but only if I'm not in the messages app, then it will show the message notification badge when I get back in." Jjc123cj on Reddit said, "Don't test this on your iPhone 6! I sent it to myself and now my messaging app crashes when I try to open it ):" Apple News on Twitter has spoken to Apple's senior engineers who admitted they know there is a problem and said that they are hard at work trying to fix it. Sent from my iPhone -- The following information is important for all members of the viphone list. All new members to the this list are moderated by default. If you have any questions or concerns about the running of this list, or if you feel that a member's post is inappropriate, please contact the owners or moderators directly rather than posting on the list itself. The archives for this list can be searched at http://www.mail-archive.com/viphone@googlegroups.com/. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "VIPhone" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to viphone@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/viphone. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.