Published in Mobiles

Apple pushes an enormous number of iOS security fixes

by on27 March 2019


Security and user-privacy... Apple has heard of it

Apple has released a new version of iOS which contains a whopping 51 security fixes including one which turned on your microphone so hackers could bug your conversations.

At the same time Apple was promoting its new streaming TV offerings Monday, it pushed a massive amount of security fixes along with its newest operating system -- 51 to be exact.

The worst flaw allowed malicious applications to access the microphone on your iPhone and record you and those around you.

The fruity cargo cult fixed a problem with the FaceTime app that prevented video chats from pausing when you left the app.

Another fix closed a loophole that allowed users to access sensitive information in the Messages app and websites visited through Safari to see information from their phone's light and motion sensors.

Others dealt with phone memory and SMS hacking. Some of the patches impact devices other than iPhones, such as laptops and iPads.

The iPhone's previous operating system, iOS 12.1.4, was released in February after the discovery of a bug in FaceTime that allowed the camera and microphones of iPhones to be accessed without the user's permission.

Apple has done little to highlight the bugs, or issue press releases to suggest its users upgrade at once. This is because the fixes come ahead of Apple's big push into content and entertainment.

Ironically during its press event Monday, Apple harped on about how important privacy was for new services. Given that most of the bugs were about user privacy we guess that pledge is only as good as Apple’s software teams who seem to have difficultly writing code which can adapt to summer time.



 

Last modified on 27 March 2019
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