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Apple’s latest iOS software update remedies an iPhone code glitch that was clogging up 911 lines with bogus calls across the country.
Read more: Warning: Newly discovered security holes in free online password manager
As if 911 operators didn’t already have enough to deal with, they were being hit with a massive influx of fake calls beginning October 2016 that resulted from a bug in iOS software.
The problem was an 18-year-old hacker in Arizona allegedly found a glitch in the code that caused iPhones to repeatedly dial 911. The hack worked because iPhone software previously allowed users to initiate a call by clicking just once on a phone number.
Things really picked up when the hacker shared the exploit on Twitter and teenagers around the nation began prank calling 911 en masse.
Operators in at least a dozen states were overwhelmed by thousands of prank calls, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Apple released an update this week that shores up the vulnerability across all apps. As a result, users will now always have to press a second confirmation before a call can go through.
This isn’t the first problem 911 has seen with legitimate calls getting through in recent weeks.
In early March, a 6-month-old infant died after his babysitter was unable to reach 911 operators. That event took place in Dallas at a time when the city was experiencing an ongoing problem with 911 calls getting through on T-Mobile’s network.
And days before that happened, AT&T had a service outage that prevented mobile callers in Florida, Tennessee, Texas and other states from reaching 911 emergency service.
Read more: This secret iPhone code unlocks a hidden feature that may come in handy
This post was last modified on March 31, 2017 9:40 am
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