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Apple releases a new version of iOS 9.3 that won’t brick older devices

Published Mar 28th, 2016 1:11PM EDT
Apple iOS 9.3 Activation Bug

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Shortly after Apple released iOS 9.3 into the wild last week, it had to stop distributing the update for several of its older devices. Days later, the update is available for every compatible device once again, with one major improvement.

WARNING: Anyone can access sensitive info on your iPhone without even unlocking it

As countless complaints around the Internet can attest, the iPad Air and the iPhone 5s (along with any iPad or iPhone model older than these devices) encountered a serious bug when updating to iOS 9.3.

Once they reached the activation screen, if they entered the wrong information or were unable to remember their passwords, the entire process could stall out and essentially brick the device. In order to stop this from happening, Apple was forced to temporarily stop signing the update for many of its older phones and tablets.

As MacRumors reports, the issue has now been resolved, as Apple released iOS 9.3 build 13E237 on Monday for any device that might have been affected by the issue. The update is available over the air and on iTunes.

It’s worth noting that this is actually the second fix for iOS 9.3 in less than a week. Last Thursday, Apple issued a new version of iOS 9.3 for the GSM version of the iPad 2, which had its own separate activation bug that needed fixing. Hopefully everyone now has a working version of the update on their devices.

Jacob Siegal
Jacob Siegal Associate Editor

Jacob Siegal is Associate Editor at BGR, having joined the news team in 2013. He has over a decade of professional writing and editing experience, and helps to lead our technology and entertainment product launch and movie release coverage.