Looks like the robot overlords have found a new way to embarrass us – the latest iOS update is digging up old, deleted photos and putting them back on people’s phones without their knowledge.
This hellish issue pertains to people who have the new iOS version 17.5 and are facing old photos from devices past appearing in their camera roll once more despite having deleted them in the past. For now, there doesn’t seem to be any real fix or a statement from Apple. You just need to delete the photos again and hope they don’t crop up in 2034.
It’s important to note that not everyone who has the update gets this issue, but there also isn’t a way to stop it happening. The truly scary thing is that these photos aren’t specifically from people who use iCloud – some are from purely local storage – and they’re appearing on newer devices than the ones they were taken on.
Reddit user Specialist-Fix8525 highlighted the issue in their post claiming that previously deleted photos from way back in 2021 appeared back on their iPad. Plenty of other users chimed in with comments saying they’d been jump-scared by old images, too. Some even mention photos from as far back as 2010 rising from the grave.
To get crass for a moment, this can only really be bad. Imagine casually scrolling through your camera roll, only to be surprised by photos of ex-partners, ex-friends, late pets, family members, or, worst of all, NSFW photos you thought had been safely cleared off the face of the Earth. Horrifying.
This is likely an oopsie where someone’s gone and pressed the wrong button – but it brings a very big issue into question. Just how much of our stuff does Apple have? Is every picture – nude or clothed – that we’ve ever taken stored away somewhere, never to truly be deleted? Frankly, we want to toss that thought into the recycling bin with the rest of our deleted photos, but, at this rate, there’s a good chance it’ll be back to haunt us sooner or later.
Anyway, to relieve the stress this news may have brought on, here are some easy games and cheap games to throw yourself into and escape reality.