Police Warn Parents About iPhone NameDrop Security Concerns After Apple iOS Update

Mar. 15, 2025

Image showing an iPhone with an iOS17 software update.Photo:Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty

Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty

Police are cautioning iPhone users over security concerns related to a new feature that is part of Apple’s latest operating system software update.

One of the steps involves holding the display of an iPhone near the top of another person’s iPhone or Apple Watch, or bringing one’s Apple Watch close to another user’s Apple Watch after opening the contacts app and tapping “share.”

The company added that the feature is only for sharing new contact information, not updating an already-existing contact.

“PARENTS: Don’t forget to change these settings on your child’s phone to help keep them safe as well!,” the department wrote in a Facebook post from Sunday. They added, “Don’t lend your phone to a stranger!”

In addition to the Longwood Police Department, other law enforcement agencies around the country — including Tennessee’s Henry County Sheriff’s Office, Virginia’s Halifax Police Department, Wisconsin’s Village of Mount Pleasant Police Department and Ohio’s Middletown Division of Police — have made similar warnings,USA Todayreported.

PEOPLE reached out to Apple Thursday for comment.

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“To the extent there’s panic here about nonconsensual taking of contact information, I’m not that worried,” Mark Bartholomew, a University at Buffalo law professor who specializes in cyberlaw, told the newspaper, saying that there are measures in place to prevent theft of information.

A cybersecurity analyst forForbesadded that the “risk of a stranger accessing contact information through the feature a ‘very tenuous truth’ because accessing that information still requires physical access to an unlocked phone, adding that if a stranger already has access to an unlocked phone, ‘then it’s game over as far as privacy is concerned.’ "

source: people.com