FaceTime Audio-Spy Bug Fixed, According to Apple

Earlier this week, the internet was abuzz with news about a spy-tastic bug impacting FaceTime. The bug had been verified and had actually been known about for some time.

This is what was happening: You call someone on via FaceTime. Then, regardless of whether or not the person you were calling answered, you could use the device you were calling on’s microphone to hear what’s going on on the other end.

Motherboard explained the steps to activate this “process:”

Start a FaceTime Video call with an iPhone contact.

Whilst the call is dialing, swipe up from the bottom of the screen and tap Add Person.

Add your own phone number in the Add Person screen.

You will then start a group FaceTime call including yourself and the audio of the person you originally called, even if they haven’t accepted the call yet.

The recommendation du jour for dealing with this was simple: disable FaceTime on your phone and all other Apple products you own/use. Apple also pulled its Group FaceTime feature offline.

Now, according to TechCrunch, the bug has been fixed and a FaceTime update is on its way.

“We have fixed the Group FaceTime security bug on Apple’s servers and we will issue a software update to re-enable the feature for users next week,” said Apple in a statement, as reported by TechCrunch. “We sincerely apologize to our customers who were affected and all who were concerned about this security issue. We appreciate everyone’s patience as we complete this process.”

Apple continued: “We want to assure our customers that as soon as our engineering team became aware of the details necessary to reproduce the bug, they quickly disabled Group FaceTime and began work on the fix.”

The privacy issue came to light after reports surfaced that a 14-year-old from Arizona and his mother had tried to report the bug to Apple days before, but to no avail. Apparently they couldn’t get ahold of anyone on Apple’s end.

Image via Paul Bodea.