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This simple message can shut down iPhones

Apple iPhone users across the globe are sending pranks to one another after realising a simple text message sent from one phone to another can instantly switch off its power.

The message includes Arabic and other non-Roman characters and causes the recipient’s phone to restart and makes it difficult for them to open their Messages app.

Luckily, the text won’t reset an iPhone, as first believed.

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Discussions about the text stirred up social media, as people were sending the message to friends of family members as a joke.

Apple said in a statement on Thursday it was aware of the problem.

A company spokeswoman said in a statement: “We are aware of an iMessage issue caused by a specific series of unicode characters and we will make a fix available in a software update.”

Sending the message means your phone doesn’t become inoperable, it just reboots. You can open your messages again, as long as your prankster sends you another message.

It won’t work if you or the recipient has a Windows or Android phone.

The iMessage has puzzled many about how it actually works in shutting down an iPhone.

The working theory, via a Reddit thread on the subject, is that the phone struggles with displaying non-Western characters in banner notifications.

Eventually, that causes the phone to reboot.

Because the theory is related to banner notifications, another way to stop the problem is by switching off the ‘message notifications’.

Go to ‘settings’ on your iPhone, click on ‘notifications’, click on ‘messages’ and slide the button across that says ‘allows notifications’.

Until Apple can find a solution to the bug – may the power be with you.

Topics: Apple
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