Here’s Why Deleted iPhone Photos Have Returned to Some iOS Devices

We finally have a better understanding of why devices running iOS 17.5 have started to resurface long-deleted photos, courtesy of Apple and some third-party researchers. Although Apple released the iPhone iOS 17.5.1 update to fix the problem earlier this week, attributing it to “database corruption,” the company remained tight-lipped about what was specifically causing old files — including nudes deleted, in some reports – to start appearing on devices that never hosted them.

Elaborating the subject for 9to5Mac, Apple says it was caused by a corrupt database entry in the device’s file system, impacting files on the devices themselves and not those that were synced to iCloud. These files may have been transferred from older devices when restored from a backup or during device-to-device transfer.

A Reddit user had previously claimed in a post now deleted that the iOS 17.5 bug caused photos to resurface on an iPad that was deleted and sold to a friend. Apple, however, claims this is not possible, saying 9to5Mac All files and content are permanently deleted once a device’s data is completely erased. Essentially, Apple claims that this user did not follow the correct device reset procedure or is simply lying to gain influence on Reddit. The company said that only a small number of people were impacted by the database issue and that Apple does not have access to photo or video files on users’ phones.

Synactiv security researchers also expanded on the issue by reverse engineering the iOS 17.5.1 update used to fix it. You can find a detailed explanation at your full report here, but in short, iOS 17.5 added a migration routine responsible for scanning and reimporting photos from the file system. The routine was deleted by Apple’s recent update because it caused old files to be reindexed on the local file system and sent back to photo galleries.

“Based on this code, we can say that the photos that reappeared were still in the file systems and were only found by the migration routine added in iOS 17.5,” Synacktiv said. “Based on this analysis alone, it is not possible to conclude how the photos remained on the file system.” The Synacktiv article then directs readers to this comment on Reddit for a plausible explanation, which includes the possibility for users to save images in both the File app and the Photos app and just delete the latter.