There’s a funny reason why every AirTag in the world updated at the same time

Macworld

Usually, when Apple releases an AirTag update, it rolls it out in waves over several weeks to balance the load on its servers. One of those firmware updates was supposed to begin rolling out on Wednesday with the version 2.0.73 update reaching 100 percent of users by April 9.

But that gradual rollout didn’t happen–instead, it went to all active AirTags in the wild at the same time. And the reason why is kind of funny. Over on X (formally Twitter) @iSWUpdates spilled the beans: Apple entered the dates incorrectly in the system, causing the update to be released to all AirTags at once.

Looks like Apple accidentally set the deployment dates for the 2.0.73 AirTag firmware to 'm/d/24' instead of 'm/d/2024' that has used in previous versions and which the AirTag update system uses as date format. As a result, AirTags think the deployment dates are in the year 24… pic.twitter.com/dH5s0FrgTy— iSoftware Updates (@iSWUpdates) March 21, 2024

In the screenshots provided by @iSWUpdates, the dates for a previous update, 2.0.61, are entered in mm/dd/yyyy format. However, the dates for the new 2.0.73 update are entered as mm/dd/yy, which meant that Apple’s system interpreted the year as 24, not 2024–and since we’re well past the year 24, Apple’s system went ahead and issued the update all at once.

The only consequence to the user is that it’s possible that it took a bit longer than usual for an AirTag to update due to a logjam. Users can’t control when an update occurs; it usually happens when the controlling iPhone is in range. However, chances are you didn’t even notice the update installed.

As for what’s in the update, no one really knows outside of Apple. The company has yet to update its AirTags update support document with information on version 2.0.73. If you really want to know, check back at a later time.

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