Accidental privacy breaches are one of the biggest concerns for consumers when it comes to smartphones, and that appears to be what’s happening with some iPhones. Two members of the Reddit community said their smartphones were listening in on the conversations of other iPhone owners, and no one can now say for sure what it’s all about.

The first mention of the problem appeared a few days ago when one of the Reddit users wrote that he heard the conversation of a man driving a car and talking to someone on the phone via his iPhone 16. The surprised user checked his iPhone and saw that no apps were currently running on it. Moreover, the unidentified man’s conversation continued for a while and eventually it turned out that he had an accident. Nothing like this happened after that, but two days later the problem recurred and the user heard someone shouting obscenities on the phone through his iPhone.

Another iPhone user described the problem similarly, but in his case the overheard conversations were more normal. His smartphone played a man’s phone conversation with his colleagues at work. The user also checked his smartphone for apps running in the background but found none, which was worrying.

It is currently unknown what exactly causes this behavior of some iPhones. It is possible that this is a bug that leads to a privacy violation, and Apple is aware of this. There may be no official statement from the manufacturer if more users encounter this problem.

Reddit users offered other versions that it could lead to hallucinations, including carbon monoxide poisoning. However, the source of the problem seems to be a possible bug in iOS 18. Apple has already rolled out many unsuccessful software updates to its devices this year, and iOS 18 can also be added to this list. According to some users, the iPhone is playing audio from YouTube or another app in the background without even showing that it is working.