A newly discovered bug in Apple’s FaceTime software allows a caller to eavesdrop on other people by hearing and seeing them, even without the recipient accepting the call.
The bug was discovered this week by 9to5Mac, and after announcing it, scores of people re-created its effect in multiple tests confirming it.
The bug is connected with a recent feature that Apple added to FaceTime – the Group FaceTime feature.
The way it works is: A person initiates a group FaceTime call and that person can hear the live audio on the other person’s phone – even when the recipient has not accepted the call. The person on the other end will see no indication on their screen that their conversation is actually being transmitted.
Worse, if the person on the other end presses the power button on their iPhone or volume button, it will activate the camera. The person on the other end will see the live video of the recipient, again with the recipient’s device showing indication that any activity is being transmitted.
The new bug affects iPhones, iPads and iPods (iPod touch) running iOS 12.1, as well as, Apple computers running Mac OS Mojave that is using the newly added group FaceTime feature.
Apple has confirmed the bug exists and has disabled the group FaceTime feature for all users and announced it is planning to release a fix later this week. However, the issue could still impact one-on-one FaceTime calls. Therefore, to ensure that you can’t be affected, the easy fix, for now, is to disable FaceTime on your Apple device. Here’s how to do it…
