Q: iPhone 5s 'This cable or accessory is not certified and may not work reliably...' help?

I agree. Apple is being really dumb,

Best way is to speak with your wallets.  Our entire district picked Samsung over Iphone due to the battery life issues, garbage lightning cables, and inability to use other cables.  Previously, I thought it was just our division (600), now I found out our entire district is on board.. or was.  Yes Apple lost north of about 4700 Iphone sales through us.  Personally, I'm dumping my Iphone the 1st chance I get, once my contract is done, it's samsung (or whatever the best phone on the market is at the time).  All to think it's over an easily correctable issue with battery life, cords, and their constant update on power requirements.  Which by the way, the unapproved cords still work.

No more iphones here, Apple has lost their way and greed has taken over.

No it isn't Imac, we've had the same issue with the lightning cables since day one.  They are not durable and they seemingly have a mind of their own.  We even took the cords into an Apple store so they could do many of the things they claim works to correct, but guess what, nothing worked.  Pull out an "unapproved cable" and voila, it works.

Imagine their amazement.

I recently bought a cheapo lightning lead and pseudo USB socket off eBay for use with my car and was having the trouble mentioned. Strangely when I plugged the cheapo cable into my computers USB socket it worked fine.

I then tried my original cable with the plug in device in the car and that also seems to work fine.

I have an idea that it is the plug in pseudo USB socket that is causing the problem, after all a lead is a lead.

Well, I recently purchased a Belkin charging station at the APPLE STORE where I thought would sell only certified products to use on the Apple products, and just today the thing gave me the dreadful message that the cable was not certified. I do not understand why it worked for a while (a couple of weeks) but then suddenly it rejected the cable.

I am as frustrated as many in this blog as I continue to spend a lot of money on these specialized Apple cables that break easily. It really is pushing me to consider going to an iPhone on my upcoming upgrade.

Same thing for our company, we have 500 users that we switched from Blackberries a couple of years ago to iPhones, and I am just waiting to hear all of them complaining.  Bad decision Apple, if you are going to put a security device, make sure your "partners" are included in the change.

It is clear how Steve Jobs is missing from the company and there is not a person there that can replace his commitment with Customer Satisfaction

The most likely cause of your problem, which you would know if you read the thread because it must have been posted a hundred times by now, is dirt in the Lightning connector on the bottom of the phone that is preventing the plug from making a good contact. Clean it with a wood or plastic toothpick.

THanks, but i tried it after reading it here and in other blogs. no result. When i went to my car the car charger worked fine, as it has done always.

It is a static problem! Thanks to "allbop" for the original post.

SOLUTION:

Take your phone out of it's case for a minute or two. Sounds bizarre but it worked for me!

PS. It's NOT the cables. I have been using my original cables for over a year before this message randomly popped up. And I didn't just download new software either.

PPS. People should stop posting rants and garbage on here...it dilutes the thread for people who are really trying to find the solutions to their problems. Complain somewhere else.

Hi,

My phone has the same issue for the past two weeks my iphone 5 comes up with the same not certified message although it ISN'T plugged in and i have been using the original iphone chargers/cables since i brought it. I contacted the online support and tried the two methods suggested; cleaning the port and rebooting my phone. Also tried  taking out the sim and taking my phone out of the case

i've been searching through forums/Youtube to find a solution and didn't come across any solved cases, so if anyone managed to resolve the issue without getting a replacement please could you let me know. Thanks

I had the same issue with the cable that came with my phone. I unplugged the cable from the handset, turned it over and plugged it back in. It is working fine now. Doesn't explain WHY it is happening, but it fixed it for me.

I've got the unfortunate issue of this happening when I actually just bought a proper Apple cable. Now that's bad.

I have been a long time user of Apple products.  Family of six each with 3 generations of itouchs, 2 generations of iPhones and one iPad mini.  Charge cables of any brand worked until we bought 2 iPhone 5s.  Now the only cable that doesn't give the "device might work error" is Apple.  Read that there's a chip in the cable and/or ISO 7 has programming that gives error on non apple cables.  Best Buy says the cables they sell in store won't give error.  I bought a few different brands at Best Buy and I still get the error.  Tried different DC adapters that plug into my car cigarette lighter, error.

Called Apple tech, bla bla bla talk to the hand lip service.

I noticed that the DC adapter I plug in my cars cigrette lighter outlet does need to be 5 volt 1amp.  Older DC adapters I have are 1/2 amp.  I still get error msg but not often plus since updating to IOS 8 the phone still charges when getting error message.

Simply absurd.   My family owns 3 ipads, 3 Iphones, 3 itunes accounts, a kazillion apps and now they are making the cord I bought when my Official Iphone cord fell apart inoperable when it worked just fine for weeks before the IOS8 update???  I am an apple fan and own apple stock so I'm not a hater... Just inexcusable that they would take this step to prevent you from using a cord you bought.  That would be like LG making you buy their HDMI cables or your TV would not work, or XBOX making use use the XBOX HDMI cable or it won't work.  Absurd, offensive and not at all customer service oriented.  Sad day for Apple...

This change was introduced with iOS 7, so it is not new. You can use Apple cables or Apple Certified Cables. This was done for your own protection after many cheap knockoffs (mostly produced in China), resulted in fires, shocks, and other unfortunate incidents.

See it as you wish, but the cables are not only limited to Apple products specifically, so you can find brands that are a lot less expensive than the Apple ones. Go to Amazon and do a search for Apple Certified Cables.

Cheers,

GB

Not allowing a cheap third party charging cable....is a cheap behavior shown by Apple...there might be different needs of people....this is just like touching height of GREEDINESS...THERE IS NOT ANY TERMS & CONDITIONS WHILE BUYING iPHONE...that you have to use only APPLE accessories like charging cable if you lost/damaged the cable.....HEIGHT OF GREEDINESS shown by APPLE... Apple should rectify this and allow to use 3rd party cable...