Wouldn't it work to lend an iPhone, turn it on with the SIM holding the number and then switch off iMessages there? Wouldn't this invalidate the cached account in other iPhones?
iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
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Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#12I know it's annoying but the best solution here just seems to change your number. Don't lose your mind over this one. edit : seems like people don't understand my post. If you have a voice, the good thing to do is to make a blog post and submit it to websites like HN. The guy did it, now what can he do if he needs a quick fix? If he's in rush? Change number. It's really not that terrible and I do it every year withou…
What happens to the next person who gets that number?
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#13Changing your number should not be the solution to this problem. I recently switched from iOS to Android and have been experiencing the same issues. The OP's title says it best, "IOS holding my phone number hostage." Changing my number would require an incredible amount of inconvenience. Apple needs to address this immediately.
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#14The same thing happened to my Mom when she switched to Android this past Christmas. The solution in that case was to get her to connect her old iPhone to the Internet via Wi-Fi, and then disable iMessages.
I assume that you would need to disable iMessages on all your iDevices in order to remedy the problem.
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#15Did you try putting your SIM card back into your iPhone, then going to Settings > Messages and turning off iMessage over there? Make sure you have an internet connection too so it can "broadcast" your new status to Apple HQ. This is what I do when I'm abroad and don't want to dataroam. It's possible you already tried that and it won't make a difference - I don't use group messaging a lot.
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#16I had the same issue when switching to a Nexus 5.
https://appleid.apple.com Try going here and removing the phone number from the "Phone Numbers" section. I still have friends who try to message me and their iOS assumes I'm using iMessage. The "retry as SMS" feature is the only method that works.
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#17It probably costs like $5 to change your phone number. I think that's the best option at this point.
And it possibly costs you new business cards, and having to let everyone know that you have a new number, and changing any social profiles, etc. ...or Apple could stop making crappy software like this ;)
Unfortunately Apple has zero incentive to fix this bug. Why should they care about customers they already lost?
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#18I'm having what I think is the same problem just from getting my broken iPhone 5 replaced with a new one. Same deal with tech support - very nice, but not able to solve the problem. Sounds like a bug in iOS that could seriously stand fixing.
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#19[deleted]
Re: iOS holding my phone number hostage = the worst bug I’ve ever experienced
#20Did you try putting your SIM card back into your iPhone, then going to Settings > Messages and turning off iMessage over there? Make sure you have an internet connection too so it can "broadcast" your new status to Apple HQ. This is what I do when I'm abroad and don't want to dataroam. It's possible you already tried that and it won't make a difference - I don't use group messaging a lot.
"Let me recap: I no longer have iPhone"