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back to article Plug in your iPhone, iPad, iPod, fire up the App Store: You have new Apple patches to install

Apple has emitted a handful of software patches to address security vulnerabilities in iOS, macOS, and various peripherals. The round of updates includes a number of fixes for critical flaws in WebKit, FaceTime, and Mac and iThing kernels. FaceTime, WebKit, and Magellan fixes for iOS For iOS handhelds, the update is billed as …

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  1. Michael Jarve
    FAIL

    Must be a popular one...

    My iPhone 6 has been “Estimating time remaining...” for the past two hours, despite a reboot (in case something was stuck). Curiously, the OSK frooze as I originally posted this, but only in Safari. I’m not saying conspiracy, but...

    0 0 Reply
    1. Robert Carnegie Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Must be a popular one...

      I get my updates through iTunes on Windows; I expect it to be more robust or redoable but I'm not certain. I think that last time the download to PC took an hour and the install about ten minutes, but the phone may have had to be plugged in to the PC throughout. Maybe I'll wait a little for this one.

      0 0 Reply
      1. DML71
        Reply Icon

        Re: Must be a popular one...

        I believe for the .10 and .01 minor updates doing it OTA is quicker and it installs what is needed rather than the whole operating system.

        1 0 Reply
    2. Tiana
      Reply Icon

      Re: Must be a popular one...

      To fix your iPhone gets stuck on estimating time remaining, you can reinstall the iOS update or force restart your iPhone, If they don't work, you could use professional iOS system recovery tools such as TunesKit iOS System Recovery.

      0 0 Reply
  2. Wellyboot Silver badge
    Unhappy

    The Joy of updates

    Followed by checking every setting to make sure none have been changed from where I left them.

    Android isn't any better, updates reset everything to max slurp.

    I miss my old Blackberry.

    8 2 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The Joy of updates

      Have you ever seen your iPhone change settings on you, and if so can you provide examples? If mine has, I've never noticed - I don't check settings before/after but I know what I've set things to so I would certainly notice eventually.

      7 1 Reply
      1. pavel.petrman
        Reply Icon

        Re: The Joy of updates

        I don't check my settings either, but I've seen services and options activated after an update which I most certainly had deactivated (imessage, facetime, that bluetooth-like share thing, just to name a few). What I've never seen are the app-specific settings or restrictions.

        3 0 Reply
        1. paulf
          Reply Icon

          Re: The Joy of updates

          Yes, things do get activated during an iPhone update. Every update I've done (since at least iOS 10 I think) has enabled WiFi on my iPhone even though I always set this to off (proper off in Settings, not the fake off in the control centre). When I've very clearly turned this off I don't expect Apple to turn it back on without my agreement.

          I think the OP was alluding towards things deep within settings but my example still counts as it is a setting modified during the update process. I think I did see one or two settings elsewhere in settings being changed during an update but I don't recall the exact details.

          3 0 Reply
        2. Anonymous Coward
          Reply Icon
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: The Joy of updates

          Ah OK I don't have iMessage/Facetime deactivated so I wouldn't be able to tell if they were activated against my will.

          I do recall past upgrades turning on Bluetooth which I normally leave disabled, but that hasn't happened for a while. I think they must have fixed that issue a year or two ago. It is easy to imagine how minor issues like that would be missed during testing, since the internal Apple testers aren't likely to have that stuff turned off, and that probably extends to the sort who voluntarily downloads beta software ahead of official release.

          I was thinking more in terms of stuff that would be more of a violation, like changing privacy settings.

          0 0 Reply
          1. doublelayer Silver badge
            Reply Icon

            Re: The Joy of updates

            The major privacy things are kept. After updates, I'd recommend a trip down to privacy/location/system services, though, as sometimes they change or rename them, which can be accompanied with a turning on where you have turned it off. The one that comes to mind was their thing that is now called significant locations, but used to be called something else. I think it was around IOS 10 when that was renamed and reenabled itself. Mostly, however, apple doesn't really change that many settings as compared to android, so you're probably fine.

            0 0 Reply
  3. FlamingDeath Silver badge
    Coffee/keyboard

    HP's instant ink T&C's states you have to agree to their data slurping collection bot in order to recieve firmware updates, I kid you not

    Do we embrace this brave new world or run to the hills?

    6 1 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      HP's instant ink T&C's states you have to agree to their data slurping collection bot in order to recieve firmware updates

      A clear breach of GDPR, if that applies to you. Notify your local data protection authority - it would cost HP thousands in legal fees just to respond to a regulator's enquiry.

      2 0 Reply
  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    What about iPhone 5, iPhone 5C, and iPad 4 ?

    Those have 32-bit processors and hence limited to iOS 10. Do those go in the bin? Or were they not vulnerable in the first place?

    3 0 Reply
    1. Robert Carnegie Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: What about iPhone 5, iPhone 5C, and iPad 4 ?

      The new devices check for their own updates, I don't know if the older ones do. If they're no longer supported then that's that. Do remember that some devices and some OS versions can be crashed or exploited by a "text" message that includes noncompliant emoji, so you really could be stuck with thst problem.

      And so I bought a secondhand iPhone 6 last year.

      0 0 Reply
      1. werdsmith Silver badge
        Reply Icon

        Re: What about iPhone 5, iPhone 5C, and iPad 4 ?

        Iphone 5 is 2012 and many are still in use. It hasn't had a bad run.Still being sold for 60-70 quid as refurbs.

        There's a 5S in the office and it is currently receiving the update.

        0 0 Reply
  5. Buzzword

    Magellan

    Sadly not the antediluvian search engine.

    0 0 Reply
  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Don't forget HomePod

    Updates for that device too, including one to fix the part where Siri totally ignores anything you say. A bit like my wife, but there hasn't been a new release there in over 30 years.

    5 0 Reply
  7. Luiz Abdala
    Windows

    Speaking of patches...

    For some obscure reason, I had Acrobat Reader on my home PC, and it was unable to open a PDF document and keep it running for 15 seconds even after it updated itself. I find it surprising that the company that created a format isn't able to make an executable file that can handle it.

    So, I patched it right out of my system, and asked Chrome to handle PDF docs from now on. Which it does, instantly. It can also generate basic PDF documents, which is fine by me.

    Kinda of a stopgap solution, but it works, so...

    Any ideas?

    0 0 Reply
    1. DreamEater
      Reply Icon

      Re: Speaking of patches...

      Get yourself an old version of foxit pdf (before it became bloatware) super snappy bit of software!

      1 0 Reply
      1. Martin-73 Silver badge
        Reply Icon
        Unhappy

        Re: Speaking of patches...

        Foxit has become bloatware? TG i always save the offline installers (been bitten by the 'newer != better' bug toooo many times)

        0 0 Reply

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