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I can only conclude that one of the OS updates has broke something, and now Require attention for Face ID isn't been used in conjunction with Unlock with Apple Watch.
It seems like it doesn't even require a face at all anymore. I've found my phone unlocked in my pocket a few times since the update, including one time I pocket dialed an entire Facebook group of ~120 people. Now I'm scarred for life on this feature.
 
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Bit the bullet and ran a new iCloud back, erased and then restored my iPhone 13 PM with that backup last night—didn’t unpair the Apple Watch. After the restore, Apple Watch automatically repaired/reconnected and unlock with Apple Watch is now working again.
Wish I had known this, would have saved me a step! 🤪
 
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The Apple Watch bug apparently affected everyone who was transferring their data from their older iPhone to the iPhone 13. If we assume that the developers were working on iPhone 13 hardware with the software already preloaded, I imagine this issue would not have been picked up because the conditions never materialised for them.

I suppose it’s the classic case of a problem going unnoticed because nobody is going out of their way to look for it.
Not just those. I restored from iCloud backup because my 12 Pro was destroyed last week. In order to pair my phone I had to reset it too. Not working for me either. Same error message everyone else is getting.
 
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Not just those. I restored from iCloud backup because my 12 Pro was destroyed last week. In order to pair my phone I had to reset it too. Not working for me either. Same error message everyone else is getting.

Just so we are clear - you made a backup from your iPhone 13 and restored from that, not the backup of your iPhone 12?

Let’s just hope the fix drops tomorrow as rumoured and settles this issue once and for all.
 
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Mysteriously my MacBook now is working with my watch - just was prompted to enable "Use your Apple Watch to unlock ...."
Seems to be working as it was prior

No Reboots/Resets applied (I was holding out on the fix)
 
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As a software developer, I don’t really understand how this bug wasn’t caught. It affects everyone, no? I can understand bugs that get through that affect a percentage of the user base — but how was this not caught? Certainly there wasn’t a last minute untested change that they just lobbed out the day before. This is odd to me. The widget issue too… but I don’t think that affected everyone.
This issue also doesn’t affect everyone. It’s impossible to replicate all possible user scenarios during testing, as I’m sure you know, especially as devices and software get more and more complex. The good news is they’ve acknowledge it and are working on a fix.
 
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This issue also doesn’t affect everyone. It’s impossible to replicate all possible user scenarios during testing, as I’m sure you know, especially as devices and software get more and more complex. The good news is they’ve acknowledge it and are working on a fix.
I would agree, but they pushed this feature to accommodate mask wearing during a pandemic. I def would've thought this had to have been a part of UAT
 
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You have to reset both the watch and phone. I tried just resetting my watch, but that didn't work. Had to reset both devices and then it should work. Annoying, but you won't have to wait for an update.


I'll wait for the update.

I just got a 13 Pro Max upgraded from a 12 Pro and at first I couldn't get Car Play to work properly. Apple support eventually had me reset my network and device settings.

That a PITA to put my settings back the way I had them. Plus, all my Wifi passwords got nuked. Gone.

Car Play is working, but watch unlock isn't. Which is kinda funny. I ran the public beta of 15 for months using the mask/watch unlock feature and got used to it pretty quick. I go get the newest flagship phone and the feature stops working.

Don't get me wrong, the phone is sweet, and the macro camera is really impressive, but the irony is thick.
 
As one of the new proud 13 Pro Max owners, I was reading all up on this issue yesterday. Seems to effect most anyone who upgraded from one iPhone to another using the phone to phone transfer. Sounds like those who set it up using iCloud backup don't have the issue.
My own speculation is that something in that process of going straight phone to phone (which preserves more of your data and passwords than iCloud) screwed something up in the unlock key for the watch. But that's just a guess by me.
This is not correct. I set up my new iPhone 13 Pro via iCloud backup and I’m having this (very annoying) issue as well.
 
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This issue also doesn’t affect everyone. It’s impossible to replicate all possible user scenarios during testing, as I’m sure you know, especially as devices and software get more and more complex. The good news is they’ve acknowledge it and are working on a fix.
I understand your sentiments. With that said, being so incredibly widespread I have a hard time chalking it up to just a missed scenario. It's an incredibly common scenario. With that said, I have a lot of respect for Apple devs. Software dev is a lot more complex than most understand.

I am thinking that instead of missing this scenario or lax testing, some variable/function/task divorced from the main functionality is the culprit. Probably something minimally tied to the unlocking feature, but causes a "fatal" error. Those type of bugs are the ones that usually bite me the most.
 
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But in all seriousness. Why would you need to upgrade? I had the iPhone 3S, 4, 6S and 11. Probably upgrading again when the 15 or 16 arrives. Same with my Macs: still running the 2014 MacBook Pro, and about to upgrade to the M1X.
I get what you mean, but before you just give up, check carrier incentives. Verizon is offering a $1k trade in on 12 Pro's, so the new 13 Pro was free.
 
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When you upgrade only once in while, the difference is amazing. It’s like Christmas. Upgrading each year feels like a waste of money. But to each his own. Also: gotta make the stock owners happy.
I agree - there's only very small improvements between hardware iterations these days. I upgraded from an iPhone 8 Plus to the most recent 13 Pro Max and besides the better camera and the lack of the fingerprint sensor (which for my use cases is a loss that the better camera can't compensate) it's the same device.

No need to upgrade an iPhone every year. Do it every 4-5 years and spend the money on something more useful, like a short vacation with your spouse.
 
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If this issue is that there's a public key that was copied from the old device, but the private key was in the secure enclave and was not copyable, then I suspect this may have other ramifications as well.

I'm unable to use AirDrop with my wife's phone, despite having been able to do so in the past. I can use AirDrop with my mac. She has a different AppleID, which I speculate is the nexus for this being potentially related to the device key being wrong.

I also have an issue where I changed the password on my work machine (it's in an AD domain and requires period password changes). The AppleID system preference pane now wants me to authenticate, and is asking for the passcode on the phone. Entering it results in a failure to authorize. Again, if the same device public key is being used in this context and it's wrong, that would explain it.
 
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I'll wait for the update.

I just got a 13 Pro Max upgraded from a 12 Pro and at first I couldn't get Car Play to work properly. Apple support eventually had me reset my network and device settings.

That a PITA to put my settings back the way I had them. Plus, all my Wifi passwords got nuked. Gone.

Car Play is working, but watch unlock isn't. Which is kinda funny. I ran the public beta of 15 for months using the mask/watch unlock feature and got used to it pretty quick. I go get the newest flagship phone and the feature stops working.

Don't get me wrong, the phone is sweet, and the macro camera is really impressive, but the irony is thick.
Yup, I was on the Beta on Summer, so I was surprised to have the Watch unlock stop working. That's a real pain to get all you Wifi passwords and settings nuked, ouch!
 
When you upgrade only once in while, the difference is amazing. It’s like Christmas. Upgrading each year feels like a waste of money. But to each his own. Also: gotta make the stock owners happy.

Our practice has been once every two years. However, this year I happened to check and trading in a 12 pro for a 13 pro results in a net cost of about $300. A new battery, last I checked, is about $100, and it was getting to the point where I was considering that.
 
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Didn’t they have a spare iPhone and Apple Watch to test this? I wonder why do they have a couple of months for “beta testing” and this happens
It seems to be an issue with the combination of iPhone 13 and IOS15. I do not have this issue with my iPhone 11 and IOS15. My wife's iPhone13 has this issue, it did not with her iPhone 11 and IOS15. This explains why the beta testing public did not see it. With that said, why did Apple not see it with their internal testing?
 
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I understand your sentiments. With that said, being so incredibly widespread I have a hard time chalking it up to just a missed scenario. It's an incredibly common scenario. With that said, I have a lot of respect for Apple devs. Software dev is a lot more complex than most understand.

I am thinking that instead of missing this scenario or lax testing, some variable/function/task divorced from the main functionality is the culprit. Probably something minimally tied to the unlocking feature, but causes a "fatal" error. Those type of bugs are the ones that usually bite me the most.
Is it possible it’s a common scenario they should have caught? Maybe.

But it’s entirely possible there is some element that is NOT obvious that due to the sheer volume of users out there happens in some cases (but definitely not all) in the wild. Since we don’t actually know the root cause it’s hard, if not impossible to say.
 
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No need to upgrade an iPhone every year. Do it every 4-5 years and spend the money on something more useful, like a short vacation with your spouse.
I’m so tired of this attitude. Your experience/life/usage pattern is NOT universal. People need to stop assuming their experience is everyone’s experience/the majority experience.

No need to upgrade every year FOR YOU. For other people there might be any number of reasons to upgrade more frequently.
Maybe that money IS more useful to someone else spent on a new iPhone than other things. Again, different people have different priorities and needs. If you don’t need to upgrade as often, great! For YOU it’s wise to save your money and spend it elsewhere. Enjoy your vacation.
And I say that as someone who also doesn’t upgrade every year, because for me it’s not worth it anymore. But I’m not everyone. My needs are not your needs.

This forum would be dramatically better if people stopped acting like how they use their iPhone/iPad/MacBook/whatever device is not the same as everyone else. And what they like/want isn’t what everyone else likes/wants.

Enough.
 
With that said, why did Apple not see it with their internal testing?
Possibly they should have and it was a mistake not to catch it internally.
But it’s also possible that the particular combination of factors that lead to this isn’t obvious. It’s possible they did test what they though the scenario was but some extra element is involved that wasn’t obvious when coming up with a test plan.
Or, it’s even possible the scenario WAS considered but it seemed remote/difficult to test so they cut it from the test plan.
It’s impossible to cover all possible scenarios in testing. But even covering a lot of scenarios becomes prohibitively expensive in time and/or money. Products have to be released at some point, and as they get more complex the chance of bugs getting released goes up. The alternative is to either delay products longer or spend a LOT more money on testing and Apple is a smart enough company to have looked at the balance between costs of more testing before and being able to find bugs vs. releasing the product and fixing the bugs that crop up in live usage.
 
There is a fix for this already. Reset your Apple Watch, keep cell plan if you have one, reset all settings and content on iPhone, keep cell plan if all ready setup. Restore from iCloud and re pair watch. Enable unlock with Apple Watch and it will work.
 
There is a fix for this already. Reset your Apple Watch, keep cell plan if you have one, reset all settings and content on iPhone, keep cell plan if all ready setup. Restore from iCloud and re pair watch. Enable unlock with Apple Watch and it will work.
I had to do that just to get my AW6 to pair at all. And no, it didn’t fix it.
 
Funny. I moved from iPhone 11 Pro Max to iPhone 13 Pro Max, and unlocking the phone using the Apple Watch is finally reliable for me for the first time. Wasn’t always so with my 11 Pro Max.
 
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