andresr/iStock(CUPERTINO, Calif.) — Apple’s Group FaceTime is fixed and a software update will be released next week that no longer allows iPhone users to eavesdrop on others, the tech giant said in a statement Friday.
“We have fixed the Group FaceTime security bug on Apple’s servers and we will issue a software update to re-enable the feature for users next week. We thank the Thompson family for reporting the bug. We sincerely apologize to our customers who were affected and all who were concerned about this security issue,” according to the statement.
This the first time Apple has acknowledged the 14-year-old Arizona student, Grant Thompson, who said he first discovered the bug a week before Apple took the feature offline. His mother, Michele Thompson, tweeted about her son’s discovery for days before the company and media outlets picked up on it.
“I stumbled upon this glitch that like the whole world knows about now,” Thompson told ABC News in an interview Tuesday night.
The security bug allowed users to eavesdrop on the people they were FaceTiming before a call was answered.
“We want to assure our customers that as soon as our engineering team became aware of the details necessary to reproduce the bug, they quickly disabled Group FaceTime and began work on the fix. We are committed to improving the process by which we receive and escalate these reports, in order to get them to the right people as fast as possible,” the Apple said.
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