Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

iOS 14.7 Bug May Prevent iPhones With Touch ID From Automatically Unlocking Apple Watch

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
68,518
39,355


Following the release of iOS 14.7, watchOS 7.6, and several other operating system updates this week, Apple has acknowledged that a bug in iOS 14.7 could prevent users from being able to unlock their Apple Watches by simply unlocking their paired Touch ID-equipped iPhones.

iphone-unlock-apple-watch.jpg

Apple's temporary workaround for the bug is for the user to type their passcode into their Apple Watch to unlock it rather than relying on their iPhone, and Apple says the issue will be addressed in a future software update.

Users who have forgotten their Apple Watch passcodes will need to reset their Apple Watches. Enterprise users whose iPhones are loaded with MDM profiles that require alphanumeric passcodes will need to work with their MDM administrators to remove the passcode requirement and then unpair, erase, and set up their Apple Watches again.

We have seen a few signs of iOS 14.7.1 in our site analytics over the past few days, so this will presumably be a relatively short turnaround on a bug fix update rather than a more significant update with an extended beta testing period. We have not seen any sign of a larger iOS 14.8 update in our analytics, and we expect that we will only see minor bug fix updates until Apple officially releases iOS 15 in a few months.

Article Link: iOS 14.7 Bug May Prevent iPhones With Touch ID From Automatically Unlocking Apple Watch
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2021/07/20/ios-14-7-bug-iphone-unlock-apple-watch/
  • Haha
Reactions: Shirasaki and sinoka56
I just don’t understand how this keeps happening with iOS updates. 14.7 went through like 5 beta versions that were publicly available. Does Apple just go and drop untested code into the final release version? We get these “bugs that didn’t show up in the betas” like every 2-3 releases it seems. What is going on?
 
  • Like
Reactions: ZZ9pluralZalpha, xpxp2002, SantaFeNM and 12 others
Strange that something like this slipped below radars during all the many rounds of tests this update went through. Seems to be a commonly used feature - not something weird like a problems connecting to a weirdly named WiFi connection.

When things like this happen, I tend to think of "bureaucracy"; all the paperwork and documentation and what not that each update involves - be it technical, legal, managerial, etc; the requirements for approvals and signatures, from all those many, many individuals, etc.

I am going to assume that, since a few signs of 14.7.1 have already been detected per the article above, it may be that by the time Apple discovered this glitch, they may had wrapped up all the "hard work" on the "paperwork", and that they thought it is best to roll out a separate fix for this at a different time, rather than going through all that those again - considering the volume of the update, and all the unchanged stuff that would have to be reviewed again anyway in the process. I see this pattern all the time in my non-software-developing workplace.
 
  • Like
Reactions: xpxp2002, Ravi_MR, michaelnugent and 3 others
No worries. iOS 15 is around the corner and it will us awesome and great new bugs.

Honestly. Apple should change the way it develops iOS - and macOS, tvOS, watchOS to name a few.
There should be a kernel development and an app development again, like in the good old days. The kernel with all the drivers should develop slowly and secure.
Than there should be an app development and apps should be distributed using Apples AppStore.

Sorry Apple, I hate to say this, but please but please stop developing bugs. Like recently Imhad to install a macOS update and the markup functionality of Mail stopped working. But I did not want to upgrade Mail, I just wanted to install some security fixes.

Or talk about iCloud Copy & Paste. It gets worse every year - after a good start. Never touch a running system.
 
  • Like
  • Disagree
Reactions: katbel, diego.caraballo, ralph_sws and 1 other person
mxrider88 said:
Fantastic.
Five beta versions, two months, the “most mature” version of the exiting iOS 14 and we have a bug that has been reported probably hundreds of times from beta testers.
Click to expand...
It would be nice to know how many reports a bug gets. All I see in Feedback is “less than 10” or “more than 10” (which could mean 11 or 10000)
 
  • Like
Reactions: xpxp2002
KrispE00 said:
It would be nice to know how many reports a bug gets. All I see in Feedback is “less than 10” or “more than 10” (which could mean 11 or 10000)
Click to expand...
I would assume people report bugs, I really have the hope that people don’t just download beta software to show off.

I reported a continuity bug on macOS about 20 times in the last 7 years.. and it’s still there. I also emailed Federighi about it directly twice.
they reckon with beta 3 of Monterey it is fixed, but I don’t test beta anymore, the stable release is already buggy as a beta, I don’t have the patience anymore.
 
  • Like
Reactions: femike and MrFootery
insomniac86 said:
Good work beta testers 😉
Click to expand...
Well, it’s not the unpaid beta testers responsibility to test such things. Apple is sitting on a pile of money, and simply should invest more into QM and testing. Voluntary software testers can‘t replace paid testers. Anyway, I bet if you could go through all the existing bug reports, You’ll find it there.

😛
 
  • Like
Reactions: jhall8, Oscar_440, michaelnugent and 4 others
Wildkraut said:
Well, it’s not the unpaid beta testers responsibility to test such things. Apple is sitting on a pile of money, and simply should invest more into QM and testing. Voluntary software testers can‘t replace paid testers. Anyway, I bet if you could go through all the existing bug reports, You’ll find it there.

😛
Click to expand...
That’s exactly what I wrote on a response I gave to a feedback report!!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Oscar_440
Stuipdboy1000 said:
I had an issue unlocking on a Face ID phone this morning so I think it’s maybe a bit more widespread than just Touch ID phones.
Click to expand...
+1
At least sometimes it seems to work (11 Pro), but it looks like it has become very unreliable and practically not usable anymore - so it seems the bug description is incomplete & FaceID iPhones also affected by this bug.
 
  • Like
Reactions: xpxp2002
TheGeneralist said:
+1
At least sometimes it seems to work (11 Pro), but it looks like it has become very unreliable and practically not usable anymore - so it seems the bug description is incomplete & FaceID iPhones also affected by this bug.
Click to expand...
I have been playing around with it a bit more and I’ve managed to get it working some of the time but definitely not all of the time. I seem to be having more luck is I first raise the watch to wake the screen then unlock my phone, however this doesn’t seem to work every time but it’s the only way I’ve managed to get the unlock dialog on my phone. It’s certainly not as reliable as it was in 14.6.
 
  • Like
Reactions: jhall8 and xpxp2002
Apple Watch unlocking iPhone almost never works for me. iPhone unlocking Watch worked from day 1 and I didn’t even bother until recently they display a banner every time that thing happens. I don’t want to say Apple Intentionally lower the value of Touch ID devices, but messing up this is just bad.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Wildkraut
Looks to be in WatchOS 7.6, as my phone no longer unlocks the watch
and the phone has 15.0 for last few Weeks
 
  • Sad
Reactions: katbel
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back