This is my story - Error 12

THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED TO ME. I can't turn on my phone since it's in the middle of a restore and was put into recovery mode. Now after trying to fix it I went from having a phone that could run on WiFi although it didn't read my SIM card, to a dead phone that won't turn on unless I finish restoring it, which I obviously can't since it keeps crashing on "error unknown (12)" right at the end of the firmware part of the restore process. When I contacted Apple Support all they did was tell me how I should contact my carrier when it actually has nothing to do with that, and apparently nobody has an answer to this problem. This is so frustrating, I don't know if it's bad luck because from what I've searched online it has rarely happened to anyone, and nobody can help me because of the same reason. APPLE PLEASE FIX THIS!

I still have not decided the issue. Need help

I am experiencing the exact same issue. My iPhone was stuck in "Searching..." so I decided to try to restore it in DFU mode, since I was unable to turn off Find My iPhone for whatever reason. Now I am receiving error 12 and am stuck in recovery mode.

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3694#hardware

Also, you cannot restore a phone without turning off Find my iPhone if the phone has ever had iOS 7 on it.

Check that security software is temporarily turned off on your computer and make sure that you do not have a firewall running in your router.

I am currently going through the same issue! Started with my iPhone 5 "Searching" while I was at work... I called my cell Provider (Sprint) and they were unable to help over the phone or even chat... I took my cell phone home and backed it up then started restore. Got errors countless times... ( error 3 , 4019 and finally 12). I took it into Sprint repair shop in my town. They even were unable to restore on thier PC laptop and even tech used his own Mac. Nothing! They had to order me a new Iphone 5 since its near Christmas and they were totally out of iPhone 5's ...so here it is, Christmas Eve and I am without a cell phone till after the holiday! I went home and jumped online and found very little on error 12 ... Chated with Apple customer care for over and hour going through every trick in restore and ended up stuck and can not pass error 12. I'm completely at a loss here, seriously no one from Apple has a solution or insight? I have got the complete run around from Sprint and Apple. Apple wants me to go into Apple Store which has appointments 4 days from now or wait 4 days for my new iphone to come in from Sprint. I'm screwed either way! Until then I can look at my shiny black paper weight and wished I never even tried to restore just put up with the "searching" cause at least I was able to use wifi and iMessage! Now all I get is infinate loop error 12! Sorry this probably does not help , but know you're not alone!

I talked to about 20 more apple advisors (not exaggerating), I went through several troubleshooting guides, worked with the ipsw files while trying to restore my phone once again, worked with my hosts files as well, uninstalled and reinstalled iTunes, searched all over the web and read every single forum about this case, it took me about a week but basically what I'm trying to say is that I did EVERYTHING I could. The advisors at Apple Care took a look at my case notes and saw I had chatted to way too many advisors without a solution, so they set me up with a senior advisor, I did two phone calls with two different senior advisors and both of them told me I needed to replace my phone at an Apple Store near me. This issue is a hardware problem and is yet impossible to be fixed since it is very recent. I'm giving you guys a heads up that there is absolutely NO way you'll be able to fix this, I talked to some friends who have a phone fixing shop and they refused to touch my phone because they did their research and found no solution to this, so working with my phone would only end up in messing with my hardware guarantee. The senior advisors that I reached out to told me that I could trade my phone for a new phone at the Apple Store for free since it was a hardware problem and I had a guarantee. You guys would have to chat with Apple Care to know if you still have yours valid or not. It does expire shortly and if you didn't reach Apple Care or somewhere they could keep a record of the date of your problem, if it is after the expiration date most likely you would have to pay for it. But if you call in with your case and explain when it happened, it won't matter when you trade your phone, it will be for free as long as you reached out to them before it expired. If your country doesn't have an Apple Store, call the US Apple Store (1-800-694-7466) through a Skype phone call and they will help you with that. They don't ship overseas though, they always recommend you to send it to a family member that lives in the states, or someone you really can trust about it, and that person can ship the new phone back to you, but they don't ship directly to you.

That's how I solved my issue! I'm changing my phone for a new one in a few days, I wish you guys luck with changing yours! And Merry Christmas 🙂

Ethmoid man, you are everything that is wrong with these forums. This is a support community for people to trade problems and solutions. Someone saying the problem is still relevant helps people know that it's still out there and a solution is still required.

Your post telling someone who lives in the Philipines or Russia to go to an Apple Store in the US is inane, as is implying that people should stop looking for a solution just because "some people tried to help already".

Meanwhile, I also have this problem. "Searching..." for a carrier non-stop, tried all the usual stuff. Couldn't use normal Restore or "Erase" on the iPhone as Find My iPhone was enabled. Got an error something like "Find My iPhone could not be disable. Please try again" when trying to disable it.

So I tried recovery mode (plug into computer with iTunes open, hold standby and home buttons and keep holding till iTunes logo appears on iPhone screen). iTunes said it needed to upgrade the iPhone to iOS 7.0.6 to restore, which is crazy because I already did this directly on the phone last week. In any case, I tried the update, which of course failed ("The iPhone 'iPhone' could not be restored. An unknown error occurred (12)."), and my iPhone is now stuck in the Recovery mode loop as with others here.

I will go to Studio A (Taiwan's official Apple service centre) tomorrow and update here.

Unfortunately Ethmoid is correct. Apple will only provide warranty and out of warranty service in the country where the phone was purchased. Sometimes a local manager will try to help, but they are not required to.

Fortunately for me and others, you're both incorrect. My iPhone was purchased in the UK, but I walked into Studio A (Apple's official retailer and service center in Taiwan) yesterday with no appointment and had it all sorted out within an hour. While there I had to call the Apple helpline to authorise the repair, and they informed me that though there are some countries that are the exception, it's standard procedure to repair Apple products in any country where there's an Apple Store or offical Apple service center, regardless of warranty status and where the product was purchased.

As for Ethmoid, I was objecting to the fact that he basically told people to stop asking here and take it to an Apple Store. But the whole point of these forums is to try and resolve stuff without having to go to an Apple Store. When people explained that they can't take it to an Apple store so they're looking for answers here, his response was "Then go to an Apple Store!!1".

Unfortunately I don't have a whole lot of information about Error 12 to offer here. The store was unable to restore my phone, and suggested it may be a hardware issue but didn't seem too sure. In this case as I'm still covered by warranty I was offered a replacement refurbished iPhone free of charge. The out of warranty charge would have been $9300 NT, which is about $300 US. But if the error occurred while you were updating iOS as it did for me, it's always worth calling Apple to ask if they can authorise a free repair in your case.

Read all of my message again, including the last line.

Read this para of my message again, now with bold™:

While there I had to call the Apple helpline to authorise the repair, and they informed me that though there are some countries that are the exception, it's standard procedure to repair Apple products in any country where there's an Apple Store or offical Apple service center, regardless of warranty status and where the product was purchased.

If you can quote some official Apple wording to the contrary please go ahead, but the above is my experience as of yesterday. I have also had a Macbook Air repaired here, with no problems. I never had to go to a manager or anything, and there was no "trying to help" - the case was treated exactly the same as if it was bought in Taiwan.

johnmapley wrote:

If you can quote some official Apple wording to the contrary please go ahead

Read the warranty document for the country in which the phone was originally sold.

See: http://www.apple.com/legal/warranty/products/iphone-english.html

The part where it says:

IMPORTANT RESTRICTION FOR iPHONE AND iPAD SERVICE.

Apple may restrict warranty service for iPhone and iPad to the country where Apple or its Authorized Distributors originally sold the device.

For the UK:

http://www.apple.com/legal/warranty/products/iphone-english-uk.html

IMPORTANT RESTRICTION FOR iPHONE AND iPAD SERVICE.

Apple may restrict service for iPad and iPhone to the EEA and Switzerland. Only Apple or an AASP should perform service on iPhone or iPad products.

Note that the restriction appies only to iPhones and iPads. Other Apple products have a world-wide warranty. And the reason is that there are hardware differences between iPhones and iPads sold into different geographies to comply with local laws and differing technical standards, so a store in Korea may not have the parts or replacement models that are compatible with a phone purchased in the UK.