The security features on our gadgets such as tablets and smartphones exist for good enough reason. Our smartphones contain all sorts of private data, and we want to protect it from prying eyes. However, a really determined kid decided to keep at trying to unlock an iPad and ended up locking it for a total of 48 years!
A three years old kid in Washington attempted unlocking his parents’ iPad. The kid was relentless because, by the time he gave up, the iPad had been locked out for 25,536,442 minutes. This was not a hoax and a real nightmare for Evan Osnos, a staff writer at the New Yorker. Evan’s three-year-old son was probably hungry for some YouTube content and kept trying his luck with the passcode.
Evan Osnos tweeted this and received lots of helpful and unhelpful comments including putting it into restore mode to letting it sit in rice over the night. However, he updated the audience via Twitter that he was able to fix the issue by getting into the DFU (Device Firmware Update) mode and was able to restore the tablet.
It goes without saying that Evan Osnos will have some serious rules about how to handle devices in his home. Apple products are famous for their security. The issue was highlighted back in 2015 after a mass shooting in San Bernardino, California when FBI had managed to get its hands on the suspect’s phone but was unable to unlock it. The bureau tried to ask for Apple’s help but to no avail. The tech giant refused to help and told the FBI that if it unlocked one phone, it would have to cater to a plethora of requests from other countries as well. FBI eventually had to pay an unknown third party for hacking the phone.
Coming back to the topic at hand, we are happy that Evan Osnos was able to get his iPad to work again. We suggest letting the three-year-old kid have the iPad only under supervision from now onwards, Evan!
