It appears that some Apple users are being signed out of their Apple ID across their devices for no apparent reason – and are subsequently locked out of their accounts if they try signing in with their current passwords.
According to 9to5Mac, the issue has been ongoing since Friday, April 26, and is forcing users to reset their passwords despite entering the correct ones to get back into their accounts. This also creates a headache for users who have Stolen Device Protection enabled, as they’ll need to be in a trusted location and have access to all of their devices at once.
Users have taken to social media to report their experience with this annoying bug, which seems to happen completely at random. Twitter user @MaxWinebach posted that he was in the middle of a FaceTime call when he was suddenly locked out of all his Apple products.
I was mid FaceTime with @milesabovetech and my Apple account got locked and signed out of all of my Apple productstf is happeningApril 26, 2024
A Mastodon user said they were told by a member of Apple Support that “sometimes random security improvements are added to your account”, which may have prompted the random booting. Still, it seems unlikely this would impact so many users, and we can’t be sure of anything until we hear official word from Apple itself.
So, what do you do?
Overall, as an Apple user who frequently forgets passwords, I’m pretty nervous about the prospect of being locked out of my beloved TikTok-watching device. Thankfully, there seems to be no immediate need to panic if this has happened to you (or like me, you’re anxiously waiting for it to happen to you). It could simply be a harmless bug, and from what we can tell so far, it doesn’t seem related to the recent phishing attack that could lock you out of your device.
So, what can you do to protect yourself from this bug? Honestly, not much. Since everything seemed to kick off on Friday, if you’re yet to have it happen to you, there’s a good chance you’re in the clear. If you do find yourself locked out, it seems like all you have to do is reset your password and go through the tedious task of logging into all your other Apple devices as well. While this is an annoying bug it doesn’t seem too serious. Make sure you’re not reusing passwords, though – that’s a recipe for disaster.
We have reached out to Apple for comment and will update this article if an official statement is released.