What is the red dot above cellular network bars on iPhone?

you said it’s the phone app that’s using the microphone when making a phone call right?

so, if i understand this correctly, my phone is recording my conversations.

what if i do not want the app to be recording my conversations?

how do i turn this off?

i turned off microphone in settings

i thought that was enough, i was wrong.

how do i turn it off?

no. i get all three colors as well, and there is a definite difference between the orange and red dots. orange is mic and green is either just the camera or camera and mic together. the third dot, “RED” has yet to be identified other than to call us all colorblind or incompetent.

siri uses the mic, yes. but only using the mic to transmit necessitates the orange dot. does the icon turn red when something is using the mic to RECORD AUDIO TO STORAGE or possibly for stenographic (voice to text) purposes?

i think you may be right about my iphone, but the problem with my iphone isn’t a glitch or bug: it is internal, intentional, and possibly illicitly implemented, as it is starting to seem like an honest answer is not forthcoming. if you don’t know the answer to a question, don’t answer the question.

Who do you think you are?

Please show us a screen shot of your iPhone showing a red and orange dot. It is try that the orange dot will appear red with certain screen settings. This has been readily acknowledged. But yours is the first post I’ve seen where someone has claimed to see both. And if Apple was going to secretly and illegally record you why would they alert you to this?

you won’t even bother to read this whole thing, but maybe someone will get something out of it

i didn’t say, “apple”.

here are a couple examples out of context:

just because “godless” was distributed through the play store on android, doesn’t mean google wrote the code. they just unwittingly provided the vulnerability. and as far as that goes, ever hear of “triada”?

yes. i know these are droid references and have me affect on our much better iphones. i wouldn’t go back to droid even if apple started making them.

a groups of programmers went out and made moble operating systems. multiple os. droid. ios. ****, even palm and blackberry had a go at it. triada was an exploit in the original code put there deliberately. back door. droid: someone found it. windows is riddled with them. you would be a fool to believe that apple didn’t install a few as well. even the necessary ones, like for law enforcement as an example, if found, may be twisted to the dark side.

i know it’s just a little light in the top of my iphone. it really isn’t THAT big a deal. but that little red light is indicating something and it’s new. very new. and telling me that all of a sudden i’ve gone colorblind because i upgraded my ios is just as far fetched as a bunch of hackers finding a way to change the color of some pixels every time they record me every time i talk to the bank, my employer, my wife, or my mistress, to gain information that they can profit from. creditcards, secret squirrel business plans, or blackmail isn’t just in the movies, kid, and changing the color of a little orange light wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest, because if you can hack that deep into ios and do it repeatedly, ego would be through the roof, to say the least.

who am i? im just an old man that wants to know why i have three different color indicator lights on my thousand dollar phone, when there are only supposed to be two. and i want to know why some punk is treating me like an idiot when i’m not the only person with this problem. first time i saw it, if i’d read your explanation and then never saw it again: i’d have bought it.

ok, maybe it was kinda orange.

but your trying too hard and too many answers have been either removed or “modified by the moderator” for me to believe that now. call me jaded. i call it realism.

probable - no

possible - yes. just entertain the idea that maybe there is a third light you don’t know about. you obviously have resources that we don’t. use them and investigate without being so pompous. you don’t know everything. learn something and then teach something. it’s how the world grows

screen shots? not likely. there is too much information hiding in the meta data and such for me to be foolish enough to upload a screenshot to a public forum. post your personal private email address and i’ll send you them directly. better yet. post your mobile iphone number and i’ll imessage them to you. or just post a screen shot, and i’ll extract both from it and then send them to you.

no. i don’t know how to do that, but i can extract your geolocation about 50% of the time and then i could just snail mail them to you.

TucsonTech wrote:

and i want to know why some punk is treating me like an idiot

No one is treating you like an idiot. You came into this thread telling people they were wrong and you aren't willing to prove it with anything other than your word.

but your trying too hard and too many answers have been either removed or “modified by the moderator” for me to believe that now. call me jaded. i call it realism.

No one that you see in this thread has the capability of removing or modifying posts. Only the moderators can do that and they only do it when the TofU are broken. Realism to think that modified posts indicate something is amiss? I'd go more with jaded myself.

possible - yes. just entertain the idea that maybe there is a third light you don’t know about.

We would love to entertain the idea.. so why don't you confirm the idea with a screenshot?

you obviously have resources that we don’t. use them and investigate

Clearly you are mistaken. You are talking to other iPhone users here. The only resources we have are the internet and experience.

screen shots? not likely. there is too much information hiding in the meta data and such for me to be foolish enough to upload a screenshot to a public forum. post your personal private email address and i’ll send you them directly. better yet. post your mobile iphone number and i’ll imessage them to you. or just post a screen shot, and i’ll extract both from it and then send them to you.

Wow, you think someone here is going to give you their personal email? or phone number? Just because you're paranoid about what's in the metadata? That is exactly the kind of thing that will breach TofU and wind up saying [edited by moderator]

You also like to use the phrases 'punk' and 'kid'. but.. you have no idea who you're talking to and are making assumptions. I don't know Deggie personally, but I know he is older than I am.. and I'm definitely not a 'young punk'. In fact, as I understand it, the majority of the level 10 users are in their 50s-70s and have a vast amount of knowledge and experience under their belts.

I don't really even understand why you posted here. You have sounded far more 'pompous' than any of the high level users here. This is a public forum and anyone that wants can respond, whether you like it or not.

You want us to go out on a limb and trust that you have 3 dots, open our minds to the possibility.. but can't even support your claim by posting a screenshot. I have no idea what help you think we can provide without any evidence of your claim. As Deggie suggested, you should bring your phone to Apple if you think there is an unexplained indicator being displayed.

I'm also curious.. I'm including a screenshot showing one of these icons.. Where am I located?

oh and btw.. here is another screenshot..

note the one I posted previously looks more reddish and this one orange?

And how they are located in precisely the same spot?

For that, I defer to previous posts by our awesome and knowledgable high level users that comment on how background color changes the appearance of this dot (to provide more contrast when required)

Can't image the orange indicator would have been very visible in my first screenshot, would you agree?

Do you use light mode during the day and dark mode at night?

That's the only difference between my screenshots.

TucsonTech wrote:

who am i? im just an old man that wants to know why i have three different color indicator lights on my thousand dollar phone, when there are only supposed to be two. and i want to know why some punk is treating me like an idiot when i’m not the only person with this problem. first time i saw it, if i’d read your explanation and then never saw it again: i’d have bought it.

Most of the senior members of this forum are over 60, some by decades. So, the fact that you're an "old man" means you're a lot like the rest of us. We are also all your fellow users, volunteering our time to help others. You may want to keep that in mind before coming in, guns ablazin' and accusing people of being rude to you.

sue148 wrote:

How do I turn it off

Read past the first post and you'll see you cannot turn it off. If you really don't want to know if an app is using the microphone on your iPhone do the following:

1. Never make a phone call
2. Never make a FaceTime call, Skype Call, Zoom Call, MS Teams Call or any Video Chat Call
3. Never use any app which requires the microphone

There problem solved.

I also have a RED dot appear and it’s not green or orange or sometimes orange or red with different backgrounds. It’s red. And when this red dot appears it’s usually when I’m trying to make a call and the call won’t actually go through or connect. I have watched it while making calls and it stays RED I have also noticed that if I’m in 4G area it may change to 3G and the call goes through. For me when the RED dot appears my calls don’t connect as they usually do.....

How can u turn off or find out which app is using the microphone or camera when u see the ref or orange or green dot above the status bars

Are you in an active phone call when you see the dot? If you do, there's your answer. The Phone app is using the microphone.

Your linkDoes not say anything about a red dot.

The dot on my iPhone is RED. NOT orange/green.

What does the 🔴 RED dot mean????