Apple Inc. confirmed today that it’s working to fix a bug on iOS that can crash iPhones and disable access to apps and iMessage, all because of a single text character.

Italian tech blog Mobile World first spotted the bug, which affects iPhones, iPads, Macs and other Apple devices. The problems start after a user receives a message containing a specific Unicode symbol from Telugu, a language spoken by more than 74 million people in central India. For some reason, several of Apple’s devices can’t display the character and become stuck while they continue attempting to load it.

The symbol eventually crashes the iOS SpringBoard application, which is responsible for managing the home screen and launching apps, and the crashes can sometimes be so severe that users have to put their devices into recovery mode to fix it.

Unfortunately, even after affected users manage to get their device working, the problem will continue every time they reopen the app with the offending message. The only solution at the moment is for users to find a way to delete the message without having to view it, but that’s not possible for every app.

An Apple spokesperson said that the company is working on resolving the issue as quickly as possible. The bug has been spotted on the current iOS 11.2.5 version, but it is apparently fixed in the 11.3 beta update. This could be because Apple had already learned about the issue several days ago.

While it may seem strange that a random text character could bring down one of the most popular operating systems in the world, this is actually not the first weird crashing issue to hit iOS. In 2015, Apple’s devices were plagued by the so-called “Unicode of Death,” which caused similar issues when users received a message with a specific combination of Arabic characters.

Photo: Apple