The MacOS password flaw can reportedly return. Plus, some iPhones and iPads are repeatedly tanking. But you can fix the issues, with iOS 11.2 and with a Mac reboot.
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| It's been a rough week for some of Apple's popular devices. Usman Hameed/ IT-Hungamasoft |
If your iPhone began misbehaving Saturday, or if you've been worried about that "root" password vulnerability on the Mac, read on -- here's what you can do to get your devices running smoothly and safely.
A date-related flaw in iOS involving apps that send frequent reminders was reportedly causing iPhones and iPads to keep crashing as of the wee hours of Dec. 2. Apple, however, has a fix.
The company said in a support post that what you need to do if you're affected by this bug is turn off notifications for all the apps on your gadget and then update your device to iOS 11.2. After you update, you can go in and turn notifications back on.
Apple released iOS 11.2 on Saturday. In addition to the bug fix and various other tweaks, the update introduces Apple Pay Cash in the US, which allows for quick person-to-person money transfers. The update also brings faster wireless charging to the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X.
As for the "root" flaw on the Mac, that vulnerability surfaced Tuesday, and it meant strangers didn't need a password to log in to your locked Apple device running on MacOS High Sierra -- all they needed to do was type in the username "root" and leave the password field blank. Not exactly a secure setup.
Apple pushed out a fix the next day. But on Friday, Wired reported problems for Mac users who had downloaded the fix but hadn't yet updated their computer from MacOS 10.13.0 to the most recent version of the operating system, 10.13.1. If those users went ahead and updated to 10.13.1, the "root" issue reappeared. And in some cases for those users, reinstalling the "root" fix after updating the OS did not fix the issue.
Again, though, there appears to be a simple fix. The specialists Wired spoke with said that updating to 10.13.1, then installing the "root" fix and then rebooting your Mac should take care of the issue. Seems like a bit of a no-brainer, right? Remember, though, that some folks don't restart their machines all the time. If you're one of those people, take heed.
Apple didn't respond to a request for comment.
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