iPhone Calendar Virus

iPhone Calendar Spam

One of the simplest and most common forms of spam is the so-called calendar spam, which exploits your iPhone Calendar app and uses it to show different kinds of dubious notifications on your display. The way this type of spam works is an event gets automatically created in your Calendar without your permission and once the date of the event arrives a notification pops-up.

All kinds of spam messages can pop up in your iPhone’s calendar.

In many cases, the notification would ask you to click on a link or to confirm something. It is crucial to remember to not interact with such pop-up notifications if they aren’t related to events that you have added yourself. If you think that the pop-up is a form of Calendar spam, do not interact with its contents in any way if possible and simply dismiss it. There are all sorts of things that could go wrong if you tap on the notification’s confirmation button depending on the source of the spam. In some of the worst-case scenarios, you might even get redirected to sham (phishing) sites that try to trick you into providing sensitive data about yourself or to pages that spread malware infections such as Spyware and Trojans. This is especially likely if you have been targeted by a Calendar spam virus.

iPhone Calendar Virus

The most common way you could get spam in your iPhone Calendar is if the spammer that is trying to target you has knowledge of the email to which you have connected the Calendar app. This gives the spammers all they need in order to flood your Calendar with spam notifications. This is made possible because your Calendar app is synced with your email account by default and each time you receive an invitation type of email letter it gets automatically added as an event to the Calendar. This means that everyone who knows the email you’ve connected to the Calendar can spam you with fake events but it also means that it is actually rather easy to stop this type of spam (and we will tell you how you can do it).

All that being said, knowledge of your email might not be the only way to shower your Calendar with spam. There is also the possibility of having some kind of a Calendar spam virus in your iPhone, in which case you’d need to check your device for malware and remove anything that might be potentially hazardous. It is highly important that you remove the Calendar spam virus if there is one in your device because if it is allowed to stay there for long periods of time it might cause various system issues.

How to remove virus from iPhone Calendar?

This is the first thing you should try if you are getting targeted by this kind of spam. 

1. Log in yo your account at iCloud.com and tap on Calendar.
2. Tap on the Settings icon (a gear icon) located in the lower-left corner of the screen.
3. Now, select Preferences and then Advanced.
4. Change the Invitations setting from In-app notifications to Email to and provide your current email.
   
   
5. Lastly, click on Save to confirm the change.

Note that after you do that, you will no longer get any events automatically added to your Calendar. Instead, they’d go to the email you have provided. This also applies to the spam you’ve been getting – it would too go to your email, but at least you won’t be getting the spam notifications on your screen.

The next part of this post will tell you how to check your iPhone for an actual Calendar spam virus and how to deal with such a virus if it gets detected.

SUMMARY:

Remove iPhone Calendar Virus

Here is one quick way to remove Calendar Virus from your iPhone:

• First, on your iPhone/iPad, navigate to “Settings”.
• Second, tap on “Passwords and Accounts”.
• Then, navigate to Subscribed Calendars.
• Once you get there, specifically look for anything that seems questionable, unfamiliar or suspicious.
• If you detect anything, delete it.

If this doesn’t work, please proceed to the steps in the removal guide below.

Start by closing up all pop-ups that are currently open on your screen.

• In case that the pop-ups have an empty checkbox that says something like “Don’t show more alerts from this webpage”, make sure you click on the checkbox before closing the pop-up ads. This will eventually stop more alerts from showing on your screen.
• In case that you detect a Block Alerts button after you close down a pop-up on your iPhone/iPad/iPod, then tap that button. This may help you stop receiving ad notification from the same page.

If after the above-described operations a pop-up fails to get closed:

• Use Command-Option-Esc to forcefully shut your Safari browser down on your Mac. Next, choose Safari from the Applications list and force it to close. After that, you have to restart Safari, but keep the shift button while it restarts. This stops any distracting advertising from immediately opening. 
• If you press the Home button twice quickly, you can do the same on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. Then, you will see a preview of all recently used apps. To find Safari, you need to swipe left. Then, on the app’s preview, swipe up to forcibly shut it down. If you want to stop Safar from opening unwanted tabs on startup, you can do the following: navigate to Settings>>>Safari and select Clear History, and Website Data. By doing this, you will clear your browser’s history and cookies. If you want to keep them, make sure you export them beforehand.  

The second step requires you to go to Safari menu and select Preferences. After that, follow these instructions:

1. Tap on the Security icon and click on “Block pop-up windows“. This option should prevent different types of pop-ups from appearing on your browser’s screen.

2. The next thing you need to do is to check for any changes imposed on your preferred homepage and the settings of your search engines. Adware apps like this one may sometimes make changes to those. Depending on the browser and the version that you might be using, the specific instructions may be different. However, here are some generic guidelines:
   • In your browser, select the General icon to display the Homepage field. It should show the address of the Homepage you prefer or just be empty if you haven’t set a homepage.
   • Then, select the Search icon. Check if it shows the default search engine or any desired search engine that you have set. In some Safari versions, these above-mentioned settings can be found in the General panel.

The third step requires you to open your Safari browser and tap on the “Extensions” button. Some Adware programs use extensions to display pop-up ads into your browser’s screen. A list with extensions will show up and your job will be to carefully look through all of them. If you detect an extension that looks unfamiliar or you have not installed yourself, chances are it could be placed there by the Adware. That’s why,  make sure you remove everything that seems suspicious or unfamiliar.