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Text-string bug causes iOS, Android & Windows Skype apps to crash repeatedly

skype

Following last week’s discovery that receiving an obscure text string could cause the iOS Messages app to crash, a similar bug has been discovered in the Skype app on iOS, Android and Windows devices. On all these devices, chat history is loaded when the app re-opens, causing it to immediately crash again.

The text string in this case is less obscure: http://: – in other words, the first part of an URL, on its own … 

Interestingly, for an app owned by Microsoft, while Windows is vulnerable, OS X is not.

At this stage, there appears to be no way to escape from the crash loop on either iOS or Android devices. Microsoft told VentureBeat, who first spotted the bug report in the Skype community forum, that it is aware of the issue and working on a fix. Expect an updated version of Skype shortly.

It’s also possible that Microsoft will be able to follow Apple’s example in finding a temporary workaround in the meantime. Apple’s support document largely mirrored the advice we gave a couple of days earlier.

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Comments

  1. iSRS - 9 years ago

    Think every news station and local news will be teasing this story all day like they did with the iMessage one? Anyone? Anyone?

    {crickets}

  2. Yes, there is a way to get out of this loop on iOS. What you need to do is use siri and send a text to someone else. Once you do that you will be able to open your messages again. Do NOT open the text of the person you got the message from. Erase it. The other way iv’e heard you can get rid of it if you don’t have siri is to got to your photos and share a picture or video to a friend from there, and that will allow you to view your messages again.

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Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Ben Lovejoy

Ben Lovejoy is a British technology writer and EU Editor for 9to5Mac. He’s known for his op-eds and diary pieces, exploring his experience of Apple products over time, for a more rounded review. He also writes fiction, with two technothriller novels, a couple of SF shorts and a rom-com!


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