Prank Forces Siri to Swear at a 12-year-old Boy
That's not very nice, Siri.
Apple's voice activated assistant Siri is a lot of things, but foul-mouthed is not one of them. However, it seems one prankster in the United Kingdom discovered a way to force Siri swear. And swear he did, at a 12-year-old boy.*
According to the Telegraph, 12-year-old Charlie Le Quesne was at the Tesco branch in Coventry when the incident occurred. The boy was playing with a display unit iPhone 4S and asked Siri the world's population. His parents were horrified when the answer the phone gave included 'shut the f*ck up you ugly tw*t.'
The mystery was quickly solved when the boy's mother, Kim, complained to Tesco staff. As any Siri user will know, the Apple assistant refers to the user by name according to what's entered in the set-up instructions. Staff say someone had tampered with this feature, entering in the phrase as the username on the phone. However, in a statement, Tesco said that it would be sending the phone back to Apple, anyway.
"We have launched an investigation. The handset will be going back to Apple for diagnostic tests," the Telegraph cites the retailer as saying.
*For those unaware, Siri has a male voice in the United Kingdom.
- Harrod's Selling Super Expensive Porsche Design BlackBerry
- Elpida Memory Likely to Seek a Second Bailout
- Intel Prepping 40 New Xeons for the First Half of 2012
- Report: Acer and Lenovo to Launch Windows 8 Slates in 2012
- Internet Explorer Slips below 40% Market Share in 2011
- Chip Industry Had Tough Nov '11; Expects Long Term Growth
- AMD Radeon HD 7770 Pics, Specs and Benchmarks Leaked
- Opinion: The 10 Most Influential People in IT of 2011
- Genesys Logic Offers USB 3.0 Webcam Controller GL3620
- IP Company Goes After Power Management in Smartphones
- AMD Radeon HD 7970 Quad CrossFireX Stomps 3DMark Records
- Tom's Hardware Benchmark Charts and Database Updated
- Microsoft Patents Way to Avoid Walking into Sketchy Areas
- Microsoft Finally Says Goodbye to IE 6 in the U.S.
- HP Reveals New Gaming Rig and its First 27-Inch AIO PC
- Raspberry Pi Lands eBay Bidding Up To $2,700 USD
- Rumor: Intel Discontinuing Over 25 Desktop CPUs
- Microsoft Sues Retailer for Making 94,000 Fake Windows CDs
This is some pretty strange news.
That is AWESOME! I almost died laughing. I cannot believe it took this long for someone to pull it off. =)
Thats hilarious - imagine the kids face!
I'm pretty sure you guys are missing part of this story. The kid changed his name on the phone, and the phone said his name. Is it so hard to figure this out?
so, who cares? 12 years old he probably heard worse in school!
LOL.. That is the STUPIDEST thing I have ever heard..
ESPECIALLY when the fix is to just change the username..
Honestly.. It really surprises me how STUPID people are, especially when a device aimed at simplicity needs to be sent back to reset a username.
To diagnose what? That the name change worked?
Simple fix:
1. Factory Reset Phone (Or reset to Display model feature reset)
2. Set name
Wow.. -.-
This makes news?
12 yr old: siri cussed at me when i asked a question.
apple: You're asking the question wrong!!
This makes news?
Not only did it make the news but its old news as well
This makes news?
Now you are aware of the fact that you can actually make Siri swear. Consider yourself informed.
nice, that'll give him a lesson why not yo buy Apple.
because he is a 'tw*t'
For diagnostics? I swear, something this stupid must have been requested by the offended parent.
It didn't seem possible, but this stupid article got even more stupid as it went along.
r we sure this kid isnt a ugly tw*t?
maybe it was just being honest, either way why complain, i would laugh at it... 12 year old hear much worse everyday at school
so, who cares? 12 years old he probably heard worse in school!
Heard worse?? I'm sure he's said worse.
what they really need to do is to fire everyone in that store....obviously they had the credentials to change the settings....kids these days....how do people survive in the civilian world?....it boggles my mind
back in the 80's I could make my c-64 talk like a sailor. I used to set it to start "talking" a few hours after I left the house. It drove my mom nuts.
Good to know that Siri is a "dude" in the UK... Wonder why Apple decided that?
Irellevant from this story, today I saw on a Google advertise on a site a dating ad that included the firefox girl in it. I believe that nowadays, the pick every single female pic they can find from public or fb and put it there -wow.
Reminds me of I, Robot. Were the robot (Sonny) had to be deactivated and have some diagnostic tests run to see what was "wrong" with it. Turned out that there was nothing wrong with it, it was just program that way, just like Siri. This is probably a bad analogy but the movie just came to me me when I read it
Loved it..... Will try it on someone I love for sure....
And how long before the Siri black-listed-vocabulary patch is released?
I think it is pretty coincidental that the kid happened to be the first Siri user on that demo after the phone was 'tampered' with and his parents happen to be paying attn to it at the time. I'm about 80% sure it was probably the 12-year-old who actually did the tampering...
This makes me want to go to the nearest cell phone store and set the username on all the iPhones to Shithead. No no, you've just mentally pronounced it wrong. It's a real name. Shi-thi-add or something like that. Bad words are blocked on a lot of devices. That one tends not to be since it is a legitimate name. Most talking devices are not smart enough to pronounce it correctly leading to amusement. Try it on older phones too! Program it as a contact, do the voice commands option, and your phone will read it back to you probably pronouncing the name wrong. Hilarious for a while!
LOL.. That is the STUPIDEST thing I have ever heard..ESPECIALLY when the fix is to just change the username..Honestly.. It really surprises me how STUPID people are, especially when a device aimed at simplicity needs to be sent back to reset a username.To diagnose what? That the name change worked?Simple fix:1. Factory Reset Phone (Or reset to Display model feature reset)2. Set nameWow.. -.-
The company knew that all they had to do was a software setting change. Says it right in the article, "Staff say someone had tampered with this feature, entering in the phrase as the username on the phone. However, in a statement, Tesco said that it would be sending the phone back to Apple, anyway."
They are avoiding bad press by taking unnecessary precautions to fix the problem. Honestly, if you were a apple store manager, wouldn't you do the same thing? Thing about the customer base.
Pretty stupid, but I hope those parents sue Apple over it. What goes around comes around as they say.
No video?
I know what I'm doing on my lunch break...
Pretty stupid, but I hope those parents sue Apple over it. What goes around comes around as they say.
Normally I always hate frivolous law suites, but in this case, more people really do need to sue apple for ridiculous things just because of all the suites they dish out.
Sent to Apple for diagnostics? Just restore the phone. But wait, that would be too practical and wouldn't make more headlines for Apple.
When it said that to him he probably responded with:
"I'm twelve years old what is this?"