Samsung users scared after being sent ‘creepy’ notification

Message only read '1', leading people to worry that their phone had been compromised

Andrew Griffin
Thursday 20 February 2020 10:12 GMT
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Samsung users scared after being sent ‘creepy’ phone notification

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Samsung users have been left "creeped out" after receiving strange notifications.

Galaxy phone users worldwide were hit with the notification, which read only: "1".

The issue appears to have been caused by a bug, or a test within Samsung's system.

But the unusual wording and the app that sent it led many to panic and worry their phone had been compromised.

"Anyone else get that find my mobile push notification that just about gave me a heart attack?" one user wrote on Twitter. "Jesus christ Samsung."

Many users were especially concerned because the notification came from the app "Find My Mobile". That can be used for finding where in the world your phone is, as well as remotely erasing all of the data on it – leading people to worry that their location could be getting hacked into, their files could be unsafe, or both.

The notification did not actually appear to be related to anything in the app: clicking it just made the message disappear, and did not even open the "Find My Mobile" window.

For some that seemed to make the message doubly eerie, since there was no indication of why the message had appeared or what users might have triggered by opening it.

"I got this weird 'find my mobile' notif and my dumb ass clicked on it and nothing happened but I'm lowkey creeped out now," one affected user wrote.

People who claimed to have managed to discuss the issue with Samsung customer assistants said they had been told that the notification appeared to be part of a test and should be ignored.

Samsung did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Independent.

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