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Photos : “Please unlock iPhone” message even though iPhone is already unlocked

Hi 


I am running an iMac with MacOS Catalina 10.15.2 and an iPhone 11 with IOS 13.3.


Am running Photos on the MAC. When I attach my iPhone to the MAC via a USB cable I am now asked to “Please unlock iPhone” even though it is already unlocked. It used to work fine. 


Curiously  the sync mechanism in Finder works just fine.


I’ve done the following : 

re-started the iPhone (Hard re-start)

re-started the MAC

reset General>RESET>Reset location & privacy on the iPhone. Then I have re-Trusted my iphone and my MAC.

switched USB ports.

switched USB cables


None of these clears the problem.


Any thoughts ?


Thanks.

iMac 27", macOS 10.15

Posted on Jan 10, 2020 7:52 AM

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Posted on Jan 14, 2020 5:30 AM

Got the same thing... you get this erroneous message saying you have to unlock your iphone even though it was unlocked in the first place. After a minute or so it still starts importing pictures though with me.

I'm a UX architect and cognitive scientist and this is one the worst things you can do to a user, feeding faulty information... a pinwheel suggesting there is some kind of processing going on is much beter even (though also a sign of programming weakness).

Shame on you Apple!

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Question marked as Best reply

Jan 14, 2020 5:30 AM in response to MikeFromReadingUK

Got the same thing... you get this erroneous message saying you have to unlock your iphone even though it was unlocked in the first place. After a minute or so it still starts importing pictures though with me.

I'm a UX architect and cognitive scientist and this is one the worst things you can do to a user, feeding faulty information... a pinwheel suggesting there is some kind of processing going on is much beter even (though also a sign of programming weakness).

Shame on you Apple!

Jan 18, 2020 9:43 AM in response to MikeFromReadingUK

Was having this same issue until this morning. I just upgraded to Catalina and it went fine. First backup/sync with iPhone was fine (I backup to my Mac). Next day started getting the "Please Unlock" message even though phone was unlocked when I connected my phone to my Mac. Tried all the things above. No change. Then took a picture so there was something new 'on the roll' waiting for import. The "Please Unlock" disappeared and it works again. Something's not set right somewhere.....

Jan 18, 2020 10:05 AM in response to Charles Siemen

...and now the problem is gone. Here's what I've found so far...if the Mac is actively syncing/backing up with the iPhone, then Photos gets the "please unlock" message, but as soon as the sync/backup completes (the little Circle icon is totally gone) then Photos shows the phone and the "please unlock" goes away. In my old Mainframe days we'd call that an enqueue problem. Wonder if we have something like that here? Before Catalina when it was Photos and iTunes they'd work together at the same time, seems under Catalina with Photos and Finder they don't.

Jan 20, 2020 9:55 AM in response to Charles Siemen

I think Charles has characterised matters quite well in his last two posts.


This has allowed to me better qualify what is occurring for me. When I originally ran into the problem I now realise I did not have any pictures on the camera roll and so could never get rid of the unlock issue.


However connecting the phone when I have at least one picture on the camera roll means that I can start the Photo application and import photos once syncing in Finder has completed.


Not ideal but I can live with this work around for now.

Photos : “Please unlock iPhone” message even though iPhone is already unlocked

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