The function of iphone system is to push harassment information. How does iPhone stop harassing messages?

Recently, Zhao Nvshi, an iPhone user, often receives harassing messages from the "find" function, which are unsightly and involve pornographic transactions. When Ms. Zhao clicked on it, she found that there was a "Allow Friends to Invite" button hidden in the search function, which was turned on by default. A survey by Beijing Youth Daily reporter found that many netizens have encountered similar situations. In addition to "search", similar harassment information also exists in iMessage, calendar, photo album, family and other functions. Apple customer service said that at present, the system has no supervision over the content sent by this function, and users can only close related functions to solve the problem. Experts said that this problem needs the assistance of the manufacturer Apple, and Apple should cooperate with the governance projects of relevant departments to crack down on the black and gray gangs involved in such cases.

Let's take a look at the iPhone system function to push harassment information.

Recently, Zhao Nvshi, an iPhone user, often receives harassing messages from the "find" function, which are unsightly and involve pornographic transactions. When Ms. Zhao clicked on it, she found that there was a "Allow Friends to Invite" button hidden in the search function, which was turned on by default. A survey by Beijing Youth Daily reporter found that many netizens have encountered similar situations. In addition to "search", similar harassment information also exists in iMessage, calendar, photo album, family and other functions. Apple customer service said that at present, the system has no supervision over the content sent by this function, and users can only close related functions to solve the problem. Experts said that this problem needs the assistance of the manufacturer Apple, and Apple should cooperate with the governance projects of relevant departments to crack down on the black and gray gangs involved in such cases.

Phenomenon: shock! The "find" function of iPhone is used to send harassing messages.

"It's terrible. They are all inexplicable advertisements, saying that you can add QQ or something. These tweets are sent directly and displayed directly. " Ms. Zhao said that in order to study how to turn off this function, she clicked on this message. "As soon as I enter the search function, the system will automatically pop up an application for enjoying the location, saying that the harassing information party will start to enjoy the location with me and ask me if it is allowed."

Ms. Zhao said that she was troubled. Such information is received almost every week, and she seems to find no other way to avoid it except choosing the position of "no * * *". Sometimes this message pops up, and it happens that there are colleagues or other friends present, so she is embarrassed. "I have hardly used Apple's' find' function, and I have never opened my own location * * *. It seems that I just saw this function when I first set it up. I just learned that this function is used to prevent the loss of mobile phones, but I didn't expect to receive spam, "Ms. Zhao said.

On the Internet, there are many consumers who have the same experience as Zhao Nvshi. On the Internet, users keep asking questions: "Apple' discovered' harassment information. What can I do to avoid receiving such information? " "Can the iPhone search function be turned off if it receives harassment information?"

A netizen analyzed in his reply that this was because his Apple ID was leaked: "You can register a new email address on official website Apple's iCloud page, and change your Apple ID without affecting the information in the ID and purchasing items. Don't use iCloud mailbox. After the iCloud mailbox is bound, the ID cannot be changed, and there is no way to disclose it. "

Another netizen said: "When you receive the harassing message" Looking for ",please don't press or click the notification to choose any time option, and don't click" Reject ". You can delete the original notification directly by following the steps below, so as to avoid receiving more notifications. 1. Open the search; 2. Click "I"; 3. Turn off the "Allow Friends to Invite" switch.

Many netizens said that it seems that they can't send text content to others with this function. I don't know how these black products are done.

Survey: The "Allow Friends Invitation" function is implicit and turned on by default.

The dating function in iPhone search is a friend interaction function based on location. The reporter of Beiqing Daily learned that sending a friend invitation needs to meet two conditions: First, you need to enter the recipient's Apple ID, which can be directly entered or you can choose a friend in the address book; Secondly, the sender and the receiver need to turn on the Location function and the Allow Friends Invitation function at the same time. If the above two conditions are met, the sender can successfully send the invitation; After receiving the invitation, the receiver chooses to agree to share the location with the sender in real time.

The reporter of Beiqing Daily saw that there is indeed a hidden function in the "search" function of the iPhone-allowing friends to be invited. But in Apple official website, there is no detailed introduction about this function.

Searching for "Allow Friends Invitation" in the support column of Apple official website will only bring up some introductions related to the location of * * *. One of the introductions of "sharing location with friends * * *" shows that users can "1. Scroll to the bottom of the contact list and click * * * to share my location ". 2. In the "Invitation" field, type a friend's name or phone number to share the location with * * *. 3. Click "Send" and select *. Regarding how to "stop accepting new friend invitations", Apple official website said that "Allow friend invitations" can be turned off.

To this end, the reporter of Beiqing Daily contacted the customer service of Apple China. The customer service staff said that the original intention of setting this function on the iPhone is not only to let users master the positioning of various Apple devices for security purposes, but also to let users interact with their friends. "If there are other devices, after logging in to the account, you can share the location with other devices, and you can see the location of your own device in real time. If you lose it, you can find it in time according to the location. The other is that family members or friends who know each other's ID can enjoy each other's position and have an interaction. "

As for the situation that the user received a large number of invitations from strangers to make friends, Apple's official customer service staff said, "It means that he searched through your Apple ID account. Whether your ID account is mobile phone or email, he must enter this account when adding * * * to enjoy my location. One possibility is that he entered the wrong account number of the person he wants to invite and sent it to you; Or your ID account has been leaked. And if you don't choose to agree, you can refuse this invitation. "

When the reporter of Beiqing Daily asked whether Apple had certain supervision over the content sent by users through this function, the customer service said that there was indeed no supervision at present. When the reporter asked if there was a complaint channel, the customer service said, "Maybe not at present, but you can report it to us and we will record it clearly. There must be colleagues from other departments to deal with it later. " The customer service explained, "Because there is no way to supervise the sender, if his account frequently sends bad information, it is definitely risky, and there are cases where the account is blocked. It may be operated by the security department and so on. We also hope to maintain a good network environment for everyone to use. "

Follow-up: In addition to "finding", many functions of Apple have also become the entrance to harassment information.

In fact, the reporter of Beiqing Daily found that in addition to the latest "search" function, Apple has been discovered by many users before, and there are problems that many functions including iMessage, calendar and photo album have become harassment information portals. For example, for Apple mobile phone users, they often receive harassment information such as yellow information, false winning information and gambling sites on iMessage, which is also the primary source of harassment information. Fruit powder often teases "Open iMessage, and you reap the whole of Macau". Although apple's joint rectification has achieved certain results, such harassment still exists in large numbers.

Searching for related keywords on some e-commerce websites, search websites and social networking sites will lead to traces of black products. For example, a seller sells a special push software, and the price of a set is 2000- 10000 yuan. With this software, you can send the set junk information in batches from the computer. In addition, some sellers can send similar "promotional information". Many sellers said that the price of sending more than 10000 pieces is about 5-8 cents per piece. Apple ID, the core Apple account, is also sold, but the reporter of Beiqing Daily found that in recent years, black services such as "buying Apple ID" and "registering Apple ID in batches" are cheap and can be seen everywhere in major trading platforms. The price of mobile phone and email data of some websites is 10000 personal information, which is about 100 yuan, which is cheap.

For how to send the text content to others, this is actually a loophole for black employees to use Apple accounts to modify at will. The reporter of Beiqing Daily found that in fact, the logic behind the harassment push of calendars, photo albums, search and other channels is the same: they all send "* * * enjoyment" invitations after entering Apple ID, and the invitations themselves have no function of inputting text content. At this time, just change the name of * * * enjoyment calendar, the name of * * enjoyment album and personal account of friends to harassment information content, and users can see the advertising content whether they accept the invitation or not. In particular, the "find-make friends" function after accepting the invitation allows both parties to enjoy the location in real time, so the "make friends" function plate has become a flood of obscene information.

In this regard, Apple has not taken effective measures to curb pervasive harassment information. Whether facing the user's spit or the reporter's consultation of Beiqing Daily, they all said that they could only choose to turn off this function to solve similar problems, and they could only sacrifice the user experience to reduce the reception of advertisements, which was criticized by netizens as "treating the symptoms rather than the root cause".

Expert: Apple ID black production has become a "big business", and Apple should take the initiative to take responsibility.

Qi' an Pangu technical experts told Beiqing Daily that users received harassment information in search software. This may be because their Apple ID information was leaked before and was maliciously used by these black and gray products. Judging from the information content, these black and gray gangs use the function of finding the location with friends in the iPhone to send a request for sharing the location to the mobile phone owner. After the request is sent, the Apple server pushes the request information to the owner's mobile phone, and the black and gray gang sets the user name of its Apple ID as harassment information content.

He suggested that the owner delete such information after receiving it, so as not to be deceived. In addition, it is recommended to modify the Apple ID password regularly and start two-step verification to improve account security.

He said that after the centralized management of relevant departments in recent years, such harassment information has been greatly reduced, but relevant manufacturers are still recommended: 1. Establish a monitoring and governance guarantee system for such behaviors. 2. Establish complaint feedback channels, collect user complaint information, monitor the governance effect, and find similar new problems in time. 3. Cooperate with relevant departments to crack down on black and gray gangs involved in such cases.

Li Tiejun, an expert in information security, said, "Apple ID disclosure is very common and hard to prevent, just like the disclosure of mobile phone numbers of users in China. For this problem, content interception requires technical solutions from manufacturers, and Apple and Microsoft will not turn on this function because of the relevant regulations of western operators on content filtering. Apple users can only turn off some switches in privacy-related options to solve the harassment problem, so many applications of Apple are used by black ash to send spam. Like Apple, Microsoft's MSN did not stop operating until a few years ago, and so far it has not solved the problem of spreading fraudulent information. "

Ge Jia, an Internet observer, said that black Apple ID has become a "big business". Every year, a large number of Apple IDs are obtained by hackers in China, and then sold to downstream companies on the black market. They extract the full economic value of each Apple ID one by one. Pushing illegal soliciting advertisements through hacked Apple ID is a relatively terminal link in this game.

"The closeness of the Apple ecosystem means that Apple is the only master of everything in this system. Rather than saying that the IOS system has millions of developer partners, it is better to say that Apple has millions of deputies who can kill it. In this case, no matter who does something bad through the IOS system, Apple will be responsible, "Ge Jia said. "In fact, it is Apple that has the complete decision on system security, and it should be Apple that has the ultimate responsibility for system security. Apple can't run ahead when making money, and when it encounters huge problems, let everyone bear it together. "

Text/Beijing Youth Daily reporter Wen Wei Intern reporter Qiao Wei

Editor/field

IPhone system function is used to push harassment information related reading:

Apple mobile phone frequently receives spam messages, how to solve it? Teach you four methods of effective shielding.

"XXX website invites you to * * * enjoy the VIP room in Macau and try online games such as lottery tickets and slot machines ..."

Seeing such a short message, it is estimated that many Apple mobile phone users are very painful. I don't know when they started to receive spam messages called "Macau Gambling" frequently on their mobile phones. The problem is that I haven't been to Macau, and I haven't browsed websites I shouldn't have seen online. How did I get targeted by Macau Casino?

Ms. Hu, a citizen of Wuhan, is one of the victims. Since the beginning of April, the "family" APP that comes with her Apple mobile phone has received similar gambling invitation information almost every day.

"Sometimes at eleven o'clock in the evening, one will pop up suddenly, even after midnight, which has seriously affected my personal life and work and rest."

To this end, Ms. Hu tried many ways to solve it. At first, she tried to block the sender's mobile phone number, but these spam messages, each with a different ID, blocked one and thousands of others in Qian Qian. It seems that blocking the power outage is useless. Simply refuse the invitation and spam messages will still be received. Finally, Ms. Hu had to uninstall the "family" APP, thinking that she could finally be quiet for a while. As a result, mobile phones can still receive spam and special message reminders.

Ms. Hu's experience is not a case. Through the evaluation of Apple Store, we can see that thousands of Apple users are troubled by the same problem. Mr. Wu is one of them. He said:

"I started using Apple phones from 20 15. No matter how the mobile phone is changed and the system is updated, junk information related to pornography and gambling can still be sent in. And basically, the app that comes with Apple's mobile phone can be received. In addition to iMessage, mobile photo albums and calendars are enjoyed through iCloud accounts. "

Why is Apple's mobile phone spam flooding?

Compared with Apple users, most spam messages of Android users can be intercepted, so why are these spam messages targeted at Apple users?

In fact, one of the main reasons is that these spam messages are sent through the iMessage that comes with the Apple system. IMessage is an instant messaging software developed by Apple. Apple products can exchange text, pictures and videos for free. Attention is free! This is essentially different from the SMS and MMS services between telecom operators.

Compared with SMS, iMessage is an independent and closed system, more like an email. This is a unique advantage that Apple is proud of, but the advantages of this system have been exploited by criminals. Some companies or individuals make profits by sending advertisements through iMessage.

So why do advertisers prefer to send spam messages through iMessage?

First of all, once the iMessage message is sent, it will be sent to all devices registered by users, such as iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch and other devices. Convenient and fast, you can send spam messages one by one, and the efficiency is outrageous.

And the content of iMessage message is protected by end-to-end encryption technology, only the sender and the receiver can access it, and Apple cannot decrypt the data. This is undoubtedly too free for the sender of spam messages.

Secondly, the messages sent by iMessage can avoid being intercepted by most websites and systems.

Because iMessage service is integrated and encrypted with iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch and other devices at the system level, compared with traditional SMS and various instant messaging tools, the information content transmitted on iMessage will not be intercepted by the SMS gateway of basic telecom enterprises, nor will it be shielded by mobile phone security software, which indirectly leads to the situation that spam on iMessage is rampant, but it is difficult to be effectively managed.

In addition, the cost of making and disseminating spam messages by iMessage spammers is very low.

The sender of spam only needs to register an iMessage account with an email address to be eligible to send messages. Its spam messages can be written in Mac OS scripts, and only need four lines of code to be sent to various Apple devices at the fastest speed allowed by Apple.

It is precisely because of the low cost and high efficiency of sending spam messages through this system, and it is not easy to be intercepted by websites, illegal advertisers are eyeing this "fat meat", and even their technology is constantly developing, and now they can also send spam messages through iCloud data.

The harm of Apple's mobile phone accepting spam messages

Apple's iMessage service has been occupied by spam, and iMessage has accounted for more than 30% of all spam dissemination in the United States. According to a report released by Heavy Reading, a telecom industry research company, users around the world send about 328 million spam messages every day, of which Apple accounts for nearly 654.38 billion.

Spam messages are disturbing our lives, but there is also the risk of personal privacy being violated.

According to industry sources, although the Apple system is more closed and safer than the Android system, customers may still reveal the Apple ID during use.

For example, when customers browse some web pages, they will receive a message reminding them that they need to verify the Apple ID. This situation is probably a trap set by the gray industry, which is specially used to obtain the customer's Apple ID. If the user enters the password, the whole account may be taken away.

Most of the personal information of Apple mobile phone users who receive spam messages is likely to have been sold in the market, and even unscrupulous advertisers have purchased the personal information of the target users.

The disclosure of personal privacy is a very serious and frightening problem. Imagine that the photos in your mobile phone are in the hands of outsiders and are used as bargaining chips, which is unacceptable to anyone.

In this regard, Apple said that it can solve this problem by reporting spam messages, but in fact it is not a permanent cure, not to mention that the reporting process is very troublesome, and only closing the other party's id after successful reporting can not play a substantial role.

How much money does the industrialized Apple spam message make?

Because no one can effectively stop the proliferation of such spam messages, it also contributes to the gradual industrialization of spam messages.

At present, iMessage spam has become specialized and large-scale, forming a complete interest chain. Mass-sending tools such as mass senders and pseudo base stations have appeared in the mobile phone spam message industry, and many professional mass-sending tools specifically for iMessage, including "Apple Twitter", have also begun to appear widely.

Statistics show that some agents even claim that they have more than180,000 effective users of Apple mobile phones nationwide; Beijing has more than 4 million effective users; The price of each spam message sending device is about 30,000 yuan, and the charge for each spam message is about 0.035 yuan. Each device can send 60 thousand spam messages a day, and each device can earn about 2 100 yuan a day.

According to reports, "a 4S store even bought 500,000 spam push services. Charge 0.035 yuan each time, * * * spend 17500 yuan, attracting 50 customers. Finally, I sold a car with a profit of 50,000, and the 4S shop actually made a profit of 32,500. " Such data is not only embarrassing, but also scary.

Apple's Twitter agents and cooperative enterprises have made a lot of money because of their own needs and interests, but they have brought endless troubles to the majority of Apple users. Their behavior has deeply violated the rights and interests of Apple users. However, because individual users simply can't know who the advertisement sender is, and they can't provide conclusive evidence of the infringement of cooperative enterprises, they can only be cracked down by government departments, especially public security organs, which makes it very difficult for Apple users to defend their rights.

How to effectively intercept spam?

Faced with such a situation, will Apple users be willing to be "trash cans"? Is there any way to block spam?

The best way is to turn off the imessage function once and for all, and turn off imessage by setting the bar-Info. After turning off imessage, you can reject all imessage messages, but most people can't choose this way because it is a "one size fits all" way. Once imessage is closed, it will eliminate spam and block other important messages, so this method is not suitable for users who rely on imessage.

Users who can't completely turn off the imessage function can reduce the situation of receiving spam messages by filtering unknown senders.

After the setting is completed, the information will be divided into two categories. SMS sent through imessage is classified as "not in the address book" and there will be no SMS prompt. The specific operation method is to filter unknown senders by setting bar-Information.

Of course, you can also cancel the mailing address.

Because most spam messages are sent by email, canceling email can block a lot of spam messages. The specific method is to set the bar-information-send and receive-delete email contact information.

In addition, spam messages sent by Imessage can be filtered by downloading interception software from a third party.

As more and more Apple users are troubled by spam messages, developers have also found business opportunities and started to develop interception application software with interception function, such as a popular Panda app on the market. However, it should be noted that the application software will also read our own imessage message while intercepting spam messages.

In addition to the above conventional methods, we can also search the official WeChat account "1232 1" (spam message reporting acceptance center) through WeChat to handle the complaints received by spam messages.

At present, the methods mentioned above are the best choice to block spam messages from Apple users, but these methods are based on the premise of shutting down or sacrificing some unique functions, so these methods are not perfect.

In this regard, as a platform, Apple has an unshirkable responsibility. Apple has the responsibility to actively prevent users' private information data from being leaked and illegally used, and at the same time strengthen spam filtering, protect users' legitimate rights and interests, and reduce the harassment of illegal gambling information to users.