For iPhone users, the good news is you don’t have to worry about your phone getting viruses and it’s easy to remove them. However, if you suspect that your iPhone could be having a virus, owing to adware popups, messages that warn you of the presence of malware, or that ask you to ensure your device is secure on some sites, they’re usually scams. You’ll be safer reporting this behavior to Apple to get the app developer’s ID revoked or delete the app altogether.
Some iPhone users have also raised concerns that their old iPhones can’t get the latest iOS update, and the devices start acting up by calling people, changing pages, or interrupting their browsing. While this is a possible occurrence, it isn’t an indicator of a virus resident in the device. It could point to a different issue altogether, like a failing touch-screen, in which case the phone would have to be replaced.
Related: How to remove a virus on phone
iPhone almost doesn’t get viruses
iPhone is more difficult to get virus than Android phone due to the sandbox mechanism of Apple. What’s sandbox? Sandbox is designed by Apple to protect the iOS apps. Every iOS app is installed on one sandbox. With sandbox, the apps need to work in their own area. And they can’t go to other apps’ sandbox without permission. In this case, each app won’t disturb each other. This ensures the system safety.
For iPhone, you may know that you only can install apps from Apple Store, and cannot install apps from third-party sources. That is to ensure each app will be installed under the sandbox mechanism. In addition, before uploaded to Apple Store, each app has to pass the strict scrutiny. It’s not possible for virus to bypass the scrutiny. That’s why iPhones won’t get virus easily.
Though a virus is uploaded to Apple Store, they’re not able to infect the iOS system. Virus is a piece of code. It infects the computer and phone by duplicating the codes and transferring to other apps and files. But in iOS, because of the sandbox mechanism, even though the virus is installed on the phone, they’re not able to transfer their codes to other apps. So they can’t spread the infection.
A few years ago, some antivirus software could still be downloaded from Apple Store. But now, you can’t find any antivirus software on Apple Store. That’s because Apple doesn’t allow antivirus software to be uploaded to Apply Store. Since iPhone almost doesn’t get virus, antivirus won’t provide service to iOS users. Apps that doesn’t offer services are not allowed on the Apple Store.
Does your iPhone really get a virus?
As we mentioned above, it’s not easy for iPhone to get a virus. You may suspect your iPhone get a virus, but that’s probably not true. If you iPhone behaves weirdly, you can contact Apple Support for further check.
When you were browsing the internet, If your phone got pop-ups telling you that your iPhone has been infected with a virus, and you might be asked to click the links to remove the virus. Don’t trust these kind of warnings. In this situation, your iPhone probably doesn’t get a virus.
How to remove a virus from iPhone
If you still believe your iPhone has been infected by a virus, you can perform a factory reset for your iPhone to remove the virus. A factory reset will erase all data on your iPhone including the virus. Before you perform a factory reset, remember to back up your important files and data.
For the steps how to perform an iPhone factory reset, you can go to How to Restore iPhone to Factory Settings.
Hopefully you find this article helpful. If you have any questions, ideas or suggestions, feel free to leave a comment below.
