Beware of hoax articles on Social Media. Some cause this to happen!

I was scanning through Facebook the other day and came across an article that grabbed my attention. So I tapped it.

The image above shows the scary message that then popped up on my iPhone, advising me that had viruses on my iPhone and I needed to call a number immediately to rectify the damage that had already been done.

​Here's what I had to do.

The link that I tapped had taken me to a scam website, and then downloaded some website data that meant my Safari app kept returning to the same place, stopping me from doing anything else in Safari.

I have had this occur on rare occasions before and have assisted many clients whose device shows similar nasty messages. 

There was a simple solution to getting rid of this scam message and getting my Facebook and Safari working again.

I closed my Facebook app first.

I then cleared my Safari's history. This got rid of the website data that was causing the web browser to return to the same place and lock up the browser again. 

On you iPhone/iPad, clearing of history can be done from Setting -> Safari -> Clear History and Website Data. 

(If you use a default browser other than Safari, you will need to clear that browser's history and website data.)

​You can choose to just clear the recent history - especially in a case like this where the dodgy website data had just been downloaded.

(Note that, once you install iOS/iPadOS 18, all your app settings (for both Apple apps and third-party apps) will be grouped under Settings -> Apps, listed in alphabetical order. That new Apps option will be the last in the list of top level settings.)

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