--- title: "Typing These Four Characters Causes iPhones to Crash" description: "Beware, iPhone users. There is — once again — a very silly bug in iOS that causes your device to crash when you type a string of seemingly random characters. If for whatever reason you wanted to freeze up your phone, all you'd have to do is punch \"\":: into the search bar of the […]" date: "2024-08-24" modified: "2024-08-24" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/four-characters-iphone-crash" categories: - "Future Society" tags: - "apple" - "iPhone" - "smartphones" - "the digest" --- # Typing These Four Characters Causes iPhones to Crash ![The bug affects iPhones running the latest version of iOS 17, and causes the home screen app to abruptly crash.]() *\Image: Jakub Porzycki / NurPhoto via Getty / Futurism (edited) \* ## Shady Characters Beware, iPhone users. There is — once again — a very silly bug in iOS that causes your device to crash when you type a string of seemingly random characters. If for whatever reason you wanted to freeze up your phone, all you'd have to do is punch “”:: into the search bar of the Settings app, or into the search bar of your App Library, which can be reached by swiping all the way to the right on your home screen. This crashes the iPhone's Springboard — the app that controls the home screen — and closes the Settings menu before sending you back to the lock screen. The bizarre bug was [shared]() Wednesday by a security researcher on Mastodon, and was [verified by *TechCrunch*](). According to *[9to5Mac]()*, it affects iPhones running the latest version of iOS 17, and the beta builds of iOS 18 and iOS 18.1, though it's possible that other versions could be affected as well. ## Harmless, Dumb Fortunately, there don't appear to be any real risks posed by the glitch — it's just a neat trick. "It's not a security bug," said Ryan Stortz, an iOS security researcher who analyzed the bug, told *TechCrunch*. And so far, it seems it can only be triggered by the person using the device, unlike similar "[text bomb]()" bugs [in years past]() that could crash anyone's phone just by sending them a message or Tweet that contained problematic characters. In this recent case, what appears to be happening is that the characters are triggering a "Respring," which is more or less a simple restart of SpringBoard — or basically a faster way of refreshing your phone without doing a full reboot. One iOS developer [**suggested** in response]() to the original Mastodon post that — and this is *not* official technical advice — the bug is "actually a pretty useful feature." Huh. That being said, unless you really know what you're doing, you probably shouldn't mess around with this. **More on weird smartphone glitches:** *[Watching This "Alien" Video Is Crashing Pixel Phones]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()