Facebook Server Update Causes iOS Apps That Use Their SDK to Crash on Launch

Juli Clover, MacRumors:

There are multiple complaints about apps crashing continually on iOS devices on the MacRumors forums, and a wide range of apps appear to be impacted. Google’s Waze app, for example, won’t launch, and there have been complaints about apps that include Pinterest, Spotify, Adobe Spark, Quora, TikTok, and others.

Multiple developers on GitHub have attributed the problem to a Facebook software development kit used by the apps for sign-in purposes. Apps are failing to open even when users do not use the Facebook login options included.

No sympathy from me for any of the companies whose apps have been rendered useless by this bug. Facebook’s longstanding motto (and rare instance of corporate honesty from them) put it right on the tin: “Move fast and break things.”

Facebook themselves are no dummies. None of their iOS apps ever break because of a bug from Google or Adobe, because they’re not foolish enough to bake in a dependency they don’t control.

★ Wednesday, 6 May 2020