American tech giant Apple got off to a ‘buggy’ start in 2019 after the discovery of a bug in its video calling app, FaceTime, which lets users hear the audio of the person they are calling even before the call has been received.
According to a 9to5mac report, this particular FaceTime bug allows you to call anyone with FaceTime, and immediately hear the audio coming from their phone even before the recipient of the call has accepted or rejected the incoming call.
Apple has acknowledged the issue and said that it will release a fix for the same in an update scheduled to be out “later this week”.
This is a major cause for worry for all iOS users who are oblivious to the fact that the caller has access to the audio before the call has been picked up. Although the call rings like normal, so you can’t be 100 percent covert about it.
Here’s how the iPhone FaceTime bug works:
- Start a FaceTime Video call with one of the iPhone contact on your list.
- While the call is dialing, swipe up from the bottom of the screen and tap the option Add Person.
- Enter your phone number in the Add Person screen.
- You will then start a group FaceTime call including yourself and will hear the audio of the person you originally called, even if they haven’t accepted the call yet.
On the callers UI, it will look like the other person has joined the FaceTime call but on the other end it will still be ringing with the lock screen activated.
It has also been found that if the person receiving the call presses down on the Power Button from the lock screen, their video is also sent to the caller without them knowing.
As of now, the bug is still active and FaceTime callers have the option to listen in to your conversations. It is recommended that you stay alert and avoid any chit-chat you wouldn’t want the other person to hear whilst you’re receiving a FaceTime call.
Until Apple releases a fix, there is no solution to this problem, and if are concerned, then you should immediately disable FaceTime in your phone’s iOS Settings.
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