A critical bug in Apple's iOS mobile operating system causes iPhone apps to crash and even disable the phone's messaging service altogether.
The bug kicks in when the phones receives a specific character. Upon receipt, the iPhone will crash and messaging will be disabled.
There is also an almost certain chance that popular messaging apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Outlook, and Gmail will be disabled.
Numerous tests by The Verge reproduced the bug successfully. They reported that it exists on iOS versions 11.2.5. In addition, Mac users are not entirely safe from the bug as it also exists in the macOS versions of Safari and Messages apps.
The bug is now nicknamed the "Telugu bug," as the characters that trigger it are from an Indian language called Telugu. What happens is that the iOS Springboard app will crash upon receipt of a Telugu character. In turn, the Messages up will be thrown into a loop of trying to load the character and failing. This makes the app inaccessible.
A possible workaround is to try and get a friend to send a message with common characters to get the Messages app running again. Then, the user could delete the thread containing the Telugu character to hopefully get rid of the bug. Still, readers should be reminded that this method is not guaranteed to work 100 percent of the time.
In any case, the bug is harder to fix when apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger are being affected. Interestingly, Telegram and Skype are unaffected by the bug.
Apple is trying to rush the fix for the bug as a significant number of users are exploiting it to "bomb" people's iPhones. The next iOS update is scheduled to be released next spring (iOS 11.3), but the company said that they will try to get a fix up even before then.
