Off and on we see news about how a string of text or certain files can crash a smartphone, and today is no different. It was recently discovered that a short 5-second MP4 clip could lock up and freeze an iPhone shortly after playing the video.
The video was first discovered by Reddit users yesterday and tested by The Verge. All you need to do is view the video with the default viewer on Safari and shortly after that, your iPhone will not respond. The Verge tested the bug on multiple iPhone devices running on the latest iOS 10.1 update, and beta copies of iOS 10.2, and it affects all devices.
According to The Verge, the problem is that the “video is corrupt, generating a loop that causes the iPhone to crash around 10 seconds after watching it”. It will only crash an iPhone when sent via a link rather than transferred as a file.
If you are unfortunate enough to be sent the file and your iPhone is not working anymore, simply perform a hard reset by holding the power button and home button, and your phone will go back to the way it used to be.
Apple has yet to address the problem so until then, don’t open files from unknown numbers, and reconsider your friends who tries to prank you with this file.
(Source: The Verge)
