Items tagged with Bug
Perhaps it is good to have a normal WiFi name or SSID, as one researcher found. Earlier this week, a new iPhone bug appeared that bricks any iPhone’s WiFi, if connected to a specifically named access point. While something like this could be used maliciously in theory, it would be hard to miss a hotspot named %p%s%s%s%s%n. On June 18th, researcher and reverse engineer Carl Schou found that when he joined his personal WiFi with the SSID set to %p%s%s%s%s%n, it “permanently disabled its WiFi functionality.” Even a reboot or changing the SSID to something else would fix the problem, he tweeted. After some testing, it was eventually found that the only way to fix this would be to...
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Were you having issues accessing apps like your Gmail on your Android device yesterday? If so, you were not alone. An issue with Android System WebView was recently causing various apps to crash. Fortunately, the problem has since been formally resolved by Google and updates are available. Android System WebView comes preinstalled on Android devices and permits apps to show webpages. It is updated fairly regularly and does not typically cause a lot of problems. Most users probably do not give it too much thought. Many users reported yesterday that several apps, including Gmail, Outlook, and Amazon Shopping, were crashing on their various Android devices. Users were at first puzzled by why...
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Early in December last year, Epic Games added the Mandalorian to Fortnite in the form of a skin. You cannot go without Grogu (Baby Yoda) when you have The Mandalorian, though, so he was added as a “back bling” at level 100. Now that players are finally starting to hit that level, they are noticing an issue with Grogu where they cannot see when they shoot. Either Grogu is a staunch pacifist and is stopping aiming, or this is a disappointing glitch for fans of The Mandalorian and Fortnite. Whatever is happening with Grogu is quite problematic for players. The bug appears when users reportedly crouch or exit vehicles. After that happens, Grogu’s floating egg seems to be attached...
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Microsoft's Windows 10 May 2020 update has been slowly rolling out over the last few weeks but this update has unfortunately brought a wide variety of issues with it. Most recently, some users have been unable to utilize the Windows 10 “Fresh Start” tool since the installation of the latest update. The Fresh Start tool allows users to install a clean version of Windows 10 on their device, perhaps recovering proper functionality from a cluttered or malfunctioning image. Users are able to keep some of their personal files, but the tool removes various third-party apps and even Microsoft Office. As a result currently, after this update, users will need to reinstall any apps...
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Twitter has announced that it is blocking the APNG image format from its service. APNG is an animated PNG file, and Twitter is taking this step because it doesn't follow standard autoplay settings. The animated images can automatically play no matter what setting the user has enabled. Twitter said that it had found a bug that allowed users to add multiple APNGs to a tweet and that the file format ignored its safeguards against auto-playing images and could cause performance issues for the app and a user's device. We want everyone to have a safe experience on Twitter. APNGs were fun, but they don’t respect autoplay settings, so we're removing the ability to add them to Tweets. This is for...
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Over one billion people rely WhatsApp on a monthly basis for both personal and business use. Security vulnerabilities could therefore prove detrimental to communication and workflow. If you use WhatsApp, you will definitely want to make sure you have the latest version installed on your device. Security researchers recently discovered a WhatsApp bug that could completely wipe out your group chat histories. Security researchers at Check Point created a tool referred to as the “WhatsApp Manipulation Tool”. The tool essentially altered the parameters of the app. The researchers were able to use the new parameters to obtain access to the encryption and decryption keys that are generated...
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Apple launched a new version of iOS this week for users that brought the operating system to version 13.3. One of the big features for the new version of iOS are new controls meant to give parents more oversight into who kids talk to on the iPhone. The problem for Apple, and parents, is that the safety controls don't work properly. According to CNBC, there are several bugs with the feature, but the biggest of them is that the update doesn't protect kids from talking to strangers on the phone, via Facetime, or text messages. The Communication Limits option that allows parents to control who their kids can talk to is supposed to prevent kids from adding new contacts unless the parent enters a PIN...
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What do Hollywood, Apple users, and Google Chrome share in common? A wave of unbootable MacBooks and Mac Pros. A Google Keystone update was able to damage certain Mac files and shut the affected devices down unexpectedly. This past week, several Hollywood film editors reported that their Mac devices were unable to reboot. Affected Apple users included the video editing team of ABC’s Modern Family. Many of these film editors use Avid Media Composer software and initially believed that a software bug or virus was to blame. Google later confessed that a Chrome update was the real culprit. Google Keystone Bug Most Mac devices include “SIP” or “system integrity protection”....
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There are few things more inconvenient in the modern world than a bricked smartphone. A security researcher recently disclosed an iMessage bug that could brick a user’s iPhone. The bug was severe enough to require users to wipe and restore their device. What caused the bothersome issue? Google Project Zero security researcher Natalie Silvanovich noted that a “malformed message” contained a text key, but not a string. She noted that another method would try to use the key as if it was a string without confirmation. This created “an exception as the selector does not exist in that class”. This exception caused Springboard, an application launcher for iPhones, to crash...
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Early last month a security researcher announced that he had discovered a severe bug in macOS that left passwords stored in keychain vulnerable. The catch was that the researcher, Linuz Henze, refused to share the flaw with Apple because he was unable to get paid for his work. While Apple operates a bug bounty program for iOS where finding and reporting bugs gets researchers money, macOS has no similar program. Henze said at the time that to exploit the bug he had discovered, all the user of the Mac computer had to do was run a simple app. Henze's refusal to share the bug with Apple was a stand against the policy of not paying for bugs found by macOS researchers. Apple and Henze were in a standoff...
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The big news of late in the Apple realm was the severe flaw in Group FaceTime that allowed users to eavesdrop on people added to the group conversation before they accepted the call (without their knowledge). The flaw could also share video from the camera of the iPhone in addition to audio. The first person to discover the bug was a 14-year-old teen named Grant Thompson, and Apple has confirmed he will get paid. While Apple has confirmed that Thompson will be paid for finding the flaw, it is being coy about how much the teen will receive. All Apple says so far is that it will compensate the family and make a contribution to Thompson's education. Thompson's mother was very vocal about the run...
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One of the features that many Apple users were looking forward to with the iOS 12 update that landed in 2018 was the Group FaceTime feature that allowed multiple users to chat and see each other at the same time. A severe bug in group FaceTime has been discovered, and the bug had users understandably upset because it would allow anyone to call via Facetime and hear what the person on the other end of the call was doing without their knowledge. The bug could be exploited to listen via the microphone of the person you are calling and possibly see video from their device before the person even picks up. The flaw was exploited by adding yourself to a FaceTime call before the person on the other end...
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Two days into the new year and already Bethesda has a new bug in Fallout 76 to annoy gamers. The new bug is leaving gamers unable to access the in-game nuke codes. Without the nuke codes, players aren't able to deploy nukes around the map. The strangest part about this bug is that since Bethesda has been so bad at communicating with players of the game, many people assumed the removal of nuke codes was intentional. Bethesda has now stepped up and confirmed that nuke code issue was not intentional, stating that it is an "issue with Nuke silo access," and it is investigating the problem right now. Speculation is that the problem with nuke access has to do with the in-game calendar since the nukes...
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Some people collect stamps, others collect vintage coins, and some companies collect your Facebook photos. Facebook recently announced that a bug allowed third-party apps to access the photos of nearly 6.8 million users. Facebook has apologized and promised to alert users whose photos may have been shared without their permission. It is believed that 1,500 apps by 876 developers were impacted by the bug between September 13th and September 25th, 2018. The issue affected apps that are able to access the photo API and the users who authorized these apps. Facebook typically only allows apps to obtain photos that are posted on a user’s timeline. This bug was also able to access content from...
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The notch isn’t the most beloved smartphone feature in the world; in fact, many people outright hate the notch. With manufacturers like Apple and others working to make screens as large as possible -- while still finding a place for the front speaker, camera, and sensors -- the notch has been a necessity. However, notch haters won't like the new flaw that some Pixel 3 XL owners have reported. The bizarre Google Pixel 3 XL bug gives the smartphone an extra notch. This second notch has turned up on the right side of the screen, and it's clear that the bug has reproduced the top of the smartphone directly on the right upper half of the device. The notch is accompanied by rounded corners that...
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PS4 gamers beware, a message is going around that will crash your console and potentially force you to perform a factory reset. Warnings on Reddit have highlighted the issue and have given PS4 gamers insight into how to protect themselves from the bug and recover if you are affected. The bug, in some instances, has been used during matches to cause the opposing team to crash and be unable to complete a match. The message received is pictured below, and the box with a question mark in it contains a null character that causes the PS4 to become unstable. Reddit users have given directions on how they have recovered from the crash. Some are having to factory reset their consoles, but some have been...
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China has no love for Taiwan, and the former's censorship has led to strange issues for some iPhone users. If users have their region set to China and someone sends them the Taiwan flag emoji, a bug in iOS could cause the app to crash. That bug has the potential to allow a remote user to launch a denial of service attack on the message receiver by continually sending them the Taiwan flag emoji. The bug was discovered by security researcher Patrick Wardle. Wardle says that the bug was first brought to his attention when a friend told him that iOS apps crashed when she typed the word "Taiwan" or received a message with the Taiwanese flag in it on a fully patched iPhone 7. In his debugging of the...
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If you own one of Samsung's Galaxy S9 or Galaxy S9 Plus smartphones a wild bug making the rounds is leaving customers on edge. Reports indicate that some users have seen the default messaging app randomly send photos from their gallery to contacts without their knowledge. One impacted user claims that the Samsung device sent the entire photo gallery to their girlfriend. Another user from reddit reported that the device had sent photos to his wife. The photos are being sent out over the stock Samsung messaging app. The particularly odd thing about this bug is that there is no record that the photos are being sent out left on the phone according to the Reddit user. There is a record, however, in...
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Tech media publications lit up yesterday afternoon, after reports showed that a critical bug in modern Intel processors has the potential to seriously impact systems running Windows, Linux and macOS. The alleged bug is so severe that it cannot be corrected with a microcode update, and instead, OS manufacturers are being forced to address the issue with software patches, which in some instances requires a redesign of the core system kernel. Some early performance benchmarks have even suggested that patches to fix the bug could result in up to a 30 percent performance hit. Since reports on the issue have exploded over the past 24 hours, Intel is looking to cut through the noise and tell its side...
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If the reports are accurate, it appears that Intel might have a pretty severe chip-level security bug on its hands that cannot be simply swatted away with a microcode update. The bug affects all modern Intel processors dating back at least a decade. We should note that squashing the bug requires a patch at the OS level; and Linux patches have already been distributed (with redacted comments). Microsoft is expected to address the bug in its monthly Patch Tuesday update. The circumstances surrounding the exploit are currently under embargo, but some details are starting to make their way to the public spotlight, thanks to reporting over at Python Sweetness and The Register. In a nutshell, the bug...
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Google has been paying out some significant money to get security researchers and hackers to tear apart its Chrome browser and Chrome OS. In March of 2015, Google offered up $100,000 for anyone who could find an exploit chain that would allow for a persistent compromise of a Chromebox or Chromebook using guest mode via a webpage. That $100,000 offer was an increase from the original $50,000 bounty.That bounty went unclaimed for many months until a researcher that uses the moniker Gzob Qq notified Google on September 18 that he had identified a set of vulnerabilities in Chrome OS. The hacker was able to identify a series of vulnerabilities that could lead to persistent code execution on Chromebooks...
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The Anniversary Update for Windows 10 brought a lot of great refinements and features to the table. However, as far too many users discovered, it also brought with it a number of bugs. From the get-go, it began locking-up on users, ultimately pushing Microsoft to endorse user-submitted fixes. Later, the update managed to kill webcams, and somehow even made some Linux users' lives miserable. Fast-forward to now, four full months after the Anniversary Edition launched, and Microsoft is dealing with yet another bug - but this one should be fixable fairly easily. Recently, some users have noticed (probably abruptly) that their Wi-Fi dropped out, with Windows complaining about an invalid IP configuration....
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