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New iMessage Hack Reportedly Bombarding Some Users With Chinese Texts

New iMessage Hack Reportedly Bombarding Some Users With Chinese Texts

By Ravi Sharma | Updated: 21 October 2016 11:06 IST

Highlights

The afftected Apple users receive iMessages and texts in Chinese
They are then alerted that their Apple ID has been compromised
This can be thwarted by changing Apple ID password

Some Apple users are complaining that a hack linked to Apple’s iMessage messaging service has bombarded their devices with Chinese text messages and iMessages from unknown numbers.

(Also see: iMessage App Store Is Here and This Is Where It's Buried on Your iPhone)

The problem first came to light when Mashable published a report citing an employee whose Mac received a message written in Chinese from an unknown phone number. Soon thereafter, she was alerted that her Apple ID had been activated on another device; the only option to close the dialog box was to click the ‘OK’ button.

After hitting the ‘OK’ button, she received a number of texts and iMessages in Chinese. She promptly changed her Apple ID password and security questions.

(Also see: Is Apple Logging Your iMessage Contacts and Sharing Them With the Police?)

But this was far from an isolated incident. Upon contacting Apple Support, she was informed that other Apple customers had encountered this issue; an Apple representative called this a likely attempt to steal the personal information of users and said that the company is working on creating a fix for this problem.

Apple has not publicly acknowledged this problem, though the company’s support team on Twitter directed affected customers to an official support page about identifying a compromised Apple ID and resetting the password.

Many others took to Twitter to air this problems:

My iMessage has been sending random messages in Chinese. Anyone else?? #apple #iPhone #help
— Kelsey Naguszewski (@xokelsey) October 19, 2016

Sooo.. My non-IPhone friends have been sending me screenshots... Apparently my Iphone is sending some Chinese message to people... HELP! pic.twitter.com/d3UjHFQSq4
— ♛ Breyoncé ♛ (@BreannaSorensen) October 17, 2016

@AppleSupport iMessage on my Mac is sending my English texts in all Chinese characters, but only to non-iPhone users can u help me
— ana gheo (@anagheo) October 13, 2016

While there is no official software release to fix this issue yet, it is best that customers set up two-factor authentication to keep their Apple accounts secure.

(Also see: iMessage App Store Is Here With Super Mario Sticker Pack and More)

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