Ghost in the iPad?
June 5, 2022 8:46 AM
Any idea what might have happened here?: The night before last I woke up in the wee hours because an Amazon Prime video was playing on the iPad that I had in bed with me ... but how is it possible?
Earlier, when I went to bed, I had a game open, as usual — Free Flow, just a simple game with a dark background that doesn't keep me awake. When I stop interacting with the game the iPad turns off, and that's that. USUALLY. This night, a few hours later I woke up to this show playing in the Prime Video app. But the thing is, when the iPad is off, it cannot be turned on just by accidentally touching it. It's fingerprint activated (which is very precise), and if I don't open it by fingerprint, I need to put in the password. Which I didn't. And I didn't navigate to Amazon Prime, choose this video, and click play at 4 a.m.
And if it matters, 1) I never use the Amazon Prime Video app on iPad, though we use it on our main TV sometimes, and 2) I'm not familiar with the show that was playing, never looked it up, never saw any promo for it. I had no computer activity on any of my devices related to this show.
My husband is the only other person in the house, and he also did not turn on the iPad. And you might think, yeah, but maaaaybe? No, definitely not. Even beyond "would he play a prank like that?" (he wouldn't), he never remembers the password for the iPad, and doesn't have fingerprint pass. I always have to open it for him, and he only uses it rarely.
(For a bit more info, this is the game), and I paid something at one point so it does not have ads on my version of the game. My iPad is 6th generation, software version 15.1, and my use is very lightweight; no porn, download sites, or borderline stuff. Normal web browsing, Metafilter, casual games, recipe app, that kind of thing. Husband sometimes uses it for Google Earth app or a night sky thingy, but mostly just uses it to take photos of his electronics work in progress.)
Any idea what might have caused this? It feels kind of creepy, tbh.
Earlier, when I went to bed, I had a game open, as usual — Free Flow, just a simple game with a dark background that doesn't keep me awake. When I stop interacting with the game the iPad turns off, and that's that. USUALLY. This night, a few hours later I woke up to this show playing in the Prime Video app. But the thing is, when the iPad is off, it cannot be turned on just by accidentally touching it. It's fingerprint activated (which is very precise), and if I don't open it by fingerprint, I need to put in the password. Which I didn't. And I didn't navigate to Amazon Prime, choose this video, and click play at 4 a.m.
And if it matters, 1) I never use the Amazon Prime Video app on iPad, though we use it on our main TV sometimes, and 2) I'm not familiar with the show that was playing, never looked it up, never saw any promo for it. I had no computer activity on any of my devices related to this show.
My husband is the only other person in the house, and he also did not turn on the iPad. And you might think, yeah, but maaaaybe? No, definitely not. Even beyond "would he play a prank like that?" (he wouldn't), he never remembers the password for the iPad, and doesn't have fingerprint pass. I always have to open it for him, and he only uses it rarely.
(For a bit more info, this is the game), and I paid something at one point so it does not have ads on my version of the game. My iPad is 6th generation, software version 15.1, and my use is very lightweight; no porn, download sites, or borderline stuff. Normal web browsing, Metafilter, casual games, recipe app, that kind of thing. Husband sometimes uses it for Google Earth app or a night sky thingy, but mostly just uses it to take photos of his electronics work in progress.)
Any idea what might have caused this? It feels kind of creepy, tbh.
How strange! The biggest question for me is how the iPad got unlocked without the fingerprint/password. Once unlocked, an accidental arm brush could have opened the Amazon Prime app and caused a show that is currently being promoted on the main screen to start playing.
Is it possible that for some reason the iPad didn't lock itself as expected when you stopped using it? It sounds like maybe you set it down and let it lock itself automatically. I'm not sure what would prevent it from locking, but that seems the most plausible to me.
posted by past unusual at 9:27 AM on June 5, 2022
Is it possible that for some reason the iPad didn't lock itself as expected when you stopped using it? It sounds like maybe you set it down and let it lock itself automatically. I'm not sure what would prevent it from locking, but that seems the most plausible to me.
posted by past unusual at 9:27 AM on June 5, 2022
Second theory on the why this show question - it looks like Free Flow is a free to play game. Does your version have ads in it? Could the game have had an ad in it for that Amazon Prime show?
posted by past unusual at 9:29 AM on June 5, 2022
posted by past unusual at 9:29 AM on June 5, 2022
The only thing I can think of is some form of accidental activation via notification popup.
Or, now that I think of it, a particularly arcane combination of the above in conjunction with having more than one Apple device connected to the same account -- do you have other iOS or Mac devices on your account? I occasionally had weird things where music would start playing at 3am, and it turned out that my knockoff wireless keyboard was getting some form of interference that caused it to execute FKey audio commands, resulting in anomalous music. Turning off my keyboard at night fixed the problem.
posted by aramaic at 9:34 AM on June 5, 2022
Or, now that I think of it, a particularly arcane combination of the above in conjunction with having more than one Apple device connected to the same account -- do you have other iOS or Mac devices on your account? I occasionally had weird things where music would start playing at 3am, and it turned out that my knockoff wireless keyboard was getting some form of interference that caused it to execute FKey audio commands, resulting in anomalous music. Turning off my keyboard at night fixed the problem.
posted by aramaic at 9:34 AM on June 5, 2022
Could Siri have picked up an errant sentence and used it to open the show?
posted by papayaninja at 9:53 AM on June 5, 2022
posted by papayaninja at 9:53 AM on June 5, 2022
+1 for a bluetooth device (wireless keyboard, in my case a speaker) overzealously searching the iPad for something to connect with.
posted by Rube R. Nekker at 10:14 AM on June 5, 2022
posted by Rube R. Nekker at 10:14 AM on June 5, 2022
Replies! ... I only have a (very, very old) wireless mouse on my Macbook. We have some wireless speakers that aren't being used presently, and must be in my husband's work space. If I invoke Siri, she says I need to unlock my iPad. My version of Free Flow doesn't have any ads. The Amazon Prime Video app is located on a different page than the game ... like I need to swipe several times to get from the page where the game is to the page where the app is. As for notifications, I usually opt out of all. The only notifications I get are for one slack group and gmail. And I just checked, and actually the sky/stars app isn't even on this iPad anymore.
posted by taz at 10:45 AM on June 5, 2022
posted by taz at 10:45 AM on June 5, 2022
Oh, also, just to set the scene: I'm in bed, lying on my side with the iPad propped on a pillow beside my head, so I'm not holding it, picking it up, putting it down, etc. It stays where it is, and I just touch the screen, not the iPad itself. So it's in exactly the same position when I wake up in the morning. If it didn't turn off, for whatever reason, brushing against it might activate something, but it would take a whole lot of pretty frenzied brushing to get out of the game, then to several pages over and open that app and actually manage to click the play button on one show ... and we weren't having that kind of frenzied activity that night, lol.
posted by taz at 11:07 AM on June 5, 2022
posted by taz at 11:07 AM on June 5, 2022
One clue here (in what you wrote, at least) is you don’t mention that you turn off the iPad. So yes, accidental touches, and yes, Siri can do all kinds of things if the iPad is unlocked.
posted by wemayfreeze at 12:23 PM on June 5, 2022
posted by wemayfreeze at 12:23 PM on June 5, 2022
You: almost asleep . iPad not yet locked.
Hubby: “hey silly, can I play dark sky?” Sees you are asleep, exits stage left.
Siri: “playing dark skies on Amazon prime”
posted by soylent00FF00 at 1:05 PM on June 5, 2022
Hubby: “hey silly, can I play dark sky?” Sees you are asleep, exits stage left.
Siri: “playing dark skies on Amazon prime”
posted by soylent00FF00 at 1:05 PM on June 5, 2022
you don’t mention that you turn off the iPad
I didn't, but it turns itself off every night once I stop interacting with the game. I've tested it while fully awake several times since this happened to see if it turns off, and it always does. It may not have, that night, for unknown reasons, but I haven't duplicated that behavior.
re, husband using iPad before it turned off: he would have told me if he had touched it at all for anything, since this is a weird mystery to both of us, and there's no way he'd let me be concerned or worried about this odd thing happening.
posted by taz at 2:07 PM on June 5, 2022
I didn't, but it turns itself off every night once I stop interacting with the game. I've tested it while fully awake several times since this happened to see if it turns off, and it always does. It may not have, that night, for unknown reasons, but I haven't duplicated that behavior.
re, husband using iPad before it turned off: he would have told me if he had touched it at all for anything, since this is a weird mystery to both of us, and there's no way he'd let me be concerned or worried about this odd thing happening.
posted by taz at 2:07 PM on June 5, 2022
Was it plugged in? I had a power adapter that was not well grounded and there was some kind of rogue current and it activated the screen on my phone a number of times before I figure it out, and did weird stuff like download random apps.
posted by mai at 8:00 PM on June 5, 2022
posted by mai at 8:00 PM on June 5, 2022
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by zadcat at 9:14 AM on June 5, 2022