Gray box whilst typing in Facebook on iPhone

TrueNorth2010 wrote:

Update Facebook. It was a bug that didn’t get along with the latest iOS update. Facebook has fixed the glitch to support iOS 18.

It was simply a bug in Facebook introduced in one of their updates on March 1. Facebook has supported iOS 18 since September without that problem. The previous 10 updates of Facebook in just the last month supported iOS 18 as well. I know it says that in the version history, but it says the same thing for every update they have. The latest iOS update to 18.3.1 was on February 10, so saying it did not get along with the latest iOS update is far from accurate, with the 10 updates in between that time that did not have that problem.

Well since all this gapping even my typing in my phone not working as good so not just FB thing ! Since updated phone my phone been really slow typing or won’t type at all til I play around with my keyboard ! Just weird ! But ty Apple support

I’m in Canada and I have the same issue. I saw a video on how to turn this off. I can’t remember the steps. Maybe google it. You can see every website who is tracking and trading your info.

I have an iPhone 12 and it was after my last update.

Time to go back to a rotary phone and a knock at the door I guess.

Corkscrew13 wrote:

I did see that comment after and I did an update, It helped. I still don’t think it’s a bad idea to secure our phones.

thanks for the info

You're welcome. In what way are you suggesting you need to secure your phone? Everything on your phone is encrypted to begin with. If you use a Passcode and are signed into Find My, your phone can't be used by anyone eles. And if you use Two Factor Authentication, there really isn't anything else you could need to do to secure your Phone. As it relates to 3rd party applications, like Facebook, what you post there is between you and Facebook and has nothing to do with Apple at all. I'd say that if anyone is concerned about what they do on social media apps, maybe they should rethink using them? That again has nothing to do with Apple or their iPhone.

https://www.snopes.com/news/2025/03/06/gray-box-facebook/

“Tracy Clayton, a spokesperson for Facebook's parent company, Meta, said the gray boxes were "the result of a bug in a version of Facebook for iOS that was introduced on March 1."

"A fix has been submitted to the App Store and should be going out in the coming days," Clayton said. "No sense yet on how widely this is occurring." “

Bizypawz wrote:

AGREED. Happens on buzzwords. Isn’t it funny how after the WH meeting, Zuck’s not fact checking the right. Flooding feeds with rightwing propaganda and now a grey box that tracks you? Much more believable than a conspiracy theory. Or a software bug. If it was a bug, it would’ve been fixed already.

Funny? NO

Disturbing? YES

You choose whatever service you want to support and without the personal information harvested from the users on Meta platforms to sell to advertisers, Zuck would have no power. I refuse to be an enabler.

Srkmeg wrote:

It only happens in political posts. I also typed the words black and brown and it appeared then, too. They’re flagging buzz words. Sorta like Russian State TV. #NotMyAmerica

If you truly believe this conspiracy theory, which is 1000% wrong, by the way, why would you even consider being on Facebook to begin with? It's an honest question. If I thought this, Facebook would be off my phone, that's for sure. But I don't subscribe to outlandish conspiracy theories and Facebook has already admitted it's a bug and nothing more, which will be fixed, if it hasn't been fixed already. They did release an update a few days ago and others who have updated have said the gray box is gone.

has anyone figured out how to stop this???

same thing was happening to me with the gray box in comments in Facebook.

THIS FIXED THE ISSUE:

go to the AppStore and update your Facebook app to the 503…version :)

Go to the App Store and “update” your Facebook app to 503 version :) Hope this helps!!

I’m getting the same thing and its only on my iPad.

its so annoying!

I also have this on Facebook and our corporate group comms platform (uses Facebook) very frustrating

Apple haven’t given British Govt access to snoop

I am getting this on my Iphone 16 as well as my Ipad Air. Very frustrating.

This is happening when I text on my IPhone 16, my IPad Air and when commenting on a FB post. Started this past week.