[ad_1]
Getting a new phone is exciting, but it can also lead to wasting an annoying amount of time adjusting settings, permissions, and notifications for all your apps. Cloud backups are supposed to make this process easier, but it doesn’t always capture everything; For example, you’ll want to double-check that COVID-19 exposure notifications are still enabled on your new iPhone 12 if you restored from a backup. They may not be, depending on BBC news.
If you are concerned that it may be affected, you can re-enable exposure notifications in iOS by opening the Settings app, selecting Exposure notifications, and clicking “Activate exposure notifications”.
Users first noticed problems with the official contact tracing app of the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK. When some iPhone 12 and 12 Pro owners tried to open the app after restoring a previous iPhone backup, they were presented with an error message. Deleting and re-downloading the app appeared to solve the problem by asking users to re-enable COVID-19 exposure notifications, but they also removed all locations where users had previously registered.
It’s unclear if this issue is unique to iPhone 12 models or if restoring any iPhone from backup could disable settings – we asked Apple and we’ll update it with what we hear. When we restored one of our own iPhone 12 phones from backup, we noticed that exposure notifications were turned off, so we suspected the problem could be at the system level rather than with specific apps like NHS.
The exposure notification system was originally announced in April and uses your phone’s Bluetooth to let you know if you’ve been in contact with someone who has tested positive for COVID-19. The resulting notification can also direct you to updated COVID-19 information online and where you can schedule a test for yourself.
Contact tracing, whether automatic or manual, is not a magic bullet for controlling COVID-19 outbreaks. But it’s one of many steps, including a robust and easily accessible testing program, that can help you find out if you’ve been infected before so you don’t contribute to the spread. Re-enabling these notifications is a low-effort way, along with wearing masks and washing your hands, to keep people out of harm’s way.
