Connecting to malicious Wi-Fi networks can mess with your iPhone
There’s a bug in iOS that disables Wi-Fi connectivity when devices join a network that uses a booby-trapped name, a researcher disclosed over the weekend.
By connecting to a Wi-Fi network that uses the SSID “%p%s%s%s%s%n” (quotation marks not included), iPhones and iPads lose the ability to join that network or any other networks going forward, reverse engineer Carl Schou reported on Twitter.
After joining my personal WiFi with the SSID “%p%s%s%s%s%n”, my iPhone permanently disabled it’s WiFi functionality. Neither rebooting nor changing SSID fixes it :~) pic.twitter.com/2eue90JFu3
Schou, who is the owner of hacking resource Secret Club, initially saw no easy way to restore Wi-Fi capabilities. Eventually, he found that users could reset network functionality by opening Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings.
Apple representatives didn’t respond to emailed questions, including if there were plans to fix the bug and whether it affected macOS or other Apple offerings.
