Apple’s Messages app is currently experiencing a peculiar issue where audio messages containing the ampersand symbol (&) fail to deliver to recipients. This glitch predominantly affects messages that include brand names or phrases such as Ben & Jerry’s, Dolce & Gabbana, and Tiffany & Co.
Users attempting to send voice messages with these names report that while the message appears sent on their device, it never reaches the intended recipient. The issue was initially highlighted in an episode of The Search Engine podcast, where the phrase Dave & Buster’s triggered the malfunction.
The root cause of this problem lies in the app’s transcription feature. When transcribing audio, Apple’s software represents the ampersand symbol in XHTML format. This encoding leads to a parsing error on the recipient’s device, activating Apple’s Blastdoor security mechanism within Messages. Blastdoor is designed to protect users by isolating and scrutinizing incoming messages for potential threats. In this case, it misinterprets the malformed transcription as a security risk, resulting in the message being blocked.
As of now, Apple has not released a fix for this issue. The recent iOS 18.5 update did not address this specific problem. Users are advised to avoid using the ampersand symbol in audio messages until a resolution is provided.
