URLs not working in Safari or Mail after iOS 9.2.1

HI Ron & fellow sufferers,

Tried leaving feedback to Apple via 4 browsers, Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Mercury... and could not. Seems disabled.

Guess new Apple policy on bugs is... ignoring customers? No presence here yet...

Like you, I've been with Apple for decades and have always seen some response, until now. So must keep on using TEMP SOLUTION indicated further up until perhaps 9.4?

Thanks to all enthusiasts and shame on Apple.

Updated to 9.3, the same problem still exists.

The iphone is paralysed without the safari. Seems Apple is forcing me to change to Android. 😠

9.2.1 and 9.3 on iPhons 6S 128GB

Tried shutting off all optional services such as background app refresh followed by battery drains and resets. Nothing has worked and the ridiculous bug persists.

8 pages of comments and complaints in multiple forums from many users, over 5k views, and still no response from Apple.

What bugged me the most was DMing @Applesupport on Twitter after piggy-backing someone else with the same issue only to have them completely ignore me.

To everyone reading this and experiencing this bug make sure to login and follow the 4 forums that are discussing / covering this issue. As the email updates come in, it generates more content. In time as this continues to snowball lets hope it hits one of the few devs at Apple that can comment.

What are these four forums?

I went from iPhone 5s 64 9.2.1, upgraded to my new iPhone 6s Plus 128GB running 9.2.1, unable to open links in iMessages and default mail application without the phone freezing. I agree this is a problem, my work around is using outlook as my default email client and google chrome to open links, however, whenever people send me links via iMessages, I just cannot open them since Safari is the default. My iPad mini 3 128GB has no issues with Safari and hyperlinks. Just updated both idevices to latest iOS 9.3. iPad mini 3 running fine, but iPhone 6s Plus still has Safari hyperlink issues (iPhone freezes). Hopeful that Apple will correct this issue with the next update.

Same problem on both mine and my wife's 6s was holding my breath the update would fix it but no such luck

I am having same problem with my iPhone 6s Plus 128gb. It is so frustrating! I have also tried everything like everyone else. Also hoped 9.3 would fix problem but of course didn't. I will not restore phone as new and loose all my many apps and all my information that will take me days to get back. I am using Bing instead of Google and that at least seems to work under safari. With so many people having this problem I can't believe Apple hasn't found a solution.

I am so glad I found this thread.. I started one under iPad although this is happening on 4 of my devices.. SAME issues as everyoner else and no way to cure... here are some weird anomalies:

1 - I have 4 devices... 3 had issues 1 ipad didnt. Then 2 ipads STARTED WORKING on their own... Now nothing is working again.

2 - Actually my iphone will open links in about 10-20 seconds!! From safari or email you tap and wait and then it will open... my ipads dont work though with links.

This is an odd issue but needs to be fixed... 9.3 didnt fix it at all...

What can this be? I would think

- Some website that correupts the OS somehow

- Some weird app we call have that somehow corrups the OS

I mean resetting everything does not help....

IF anyone gets a fix and answer for this please let us all know!!

HI,

check the thread further up and you'll find some temporary solutions using CloudMagic as temp substitute for Mail and either of 4-5 browsers in lieu of Safari, etc etc

This is helping me use my iPad in almost normal manner

We are all awaiting for Apple to do something

Good luck and cheers

Andres

btw also Twittered problem to @AppleSupport and @Tim_Cook twice each

As one of the first contributors to this particular thread I am now working with three different solutions, thanks to other contributors to the discussion.:

- using the Gmail app which opens mail hypertext links using Google Chrome

- using the Outlook app configured to open mail hypertext links in Google Chrome

and that gets round the problem of hypertext links not working in the default mail app because the links default to Safari.

Like everyone else, our experience with this bug is haphazard. My wife upgraded her Air 2 64gb wifi cellular to 9.2.1 first and it was fine. I upgraded my similar Air 2 a few days later and got the bug almost immediately. Then for no apparent reason my wife's Air 2 caught the bug! Meantime my iPhone 4s running 9.2 was unaffected. I resisted the temptation to upgrade to 9.2.1.

Eventually I went for a complete reset of my Air 2 (erase all content and settings) to take it back to its original factory mode - allegedly! After taking most of the day to rebuild it I still had the bug! So despite what Apple has told others, a complete rebuild is not necessarily the solution. I am not going to try that again.

So now for my third work-around. Thanks to another contributor I turned off Javascript in Safari advanced settings and Safari search links using Google as the search engine started working and they are still working - most of the time! I did the same for my wife's Air 2 with the same result. However, hypertext links in mail continue to be useless and freeze mail. Even after the rebuild my iTunes tells me I need to update 9.2.1 although my Air 2 tells me my software is up to date.

A couple of weeks ago I upgraded my iPhone 4s to an iPhone 6. Once all set up I found the 6 to be running 9.2.1. It is fine and working normally and tells me it has the latest version of 9.2.1 although iTunes thinks it needs to update 9.2.1!

I do not propose to try 9.3 until this bug is resolved. If Apple is watching - I am writing this contribution on an Acer laptop running Windows 10 very nicely thank you.

Hi,

The issue you mention regarding 9.2.1 is separate. There were actually different "builds" for this version, the second one solving the "error 53" bug. I agree that the iPhone and iTunes were saying different things, iTunes requesting the update and the device saying it is up-to-date. I upgraded to this "second 9.2.1" (welcome to traceability by Apple, I hope no other quality manager is reading...) and the bug is still here. In my understanding, the two things are not related.

Apple please do something, you are losing customers !

#6

I am very happy to have found this forum because I now know that I am not alone. I've had the same exact problem for a while now. I even submitted beta feedback to Apple and no one responded. I have restored my iPhone 6s Plus (128GB) 5 times in the past few weeks hoping to fix the issue. After a restore, I setup the phone as new and my phone will be fine for a bit and then all of a sudden, the issue will appear. I even tried to install apps one by one to see if one of them was causing the issue. Everything worked just fine and then just of the blue, the problem occurred. It happens when I try to click links in mail and text messages and when I try to open links from a web search and when I try to open a news article on the search screen and when I try to click a link in almost any other app. When I click the link in mail or the text message app, the app will freeze and I am forced to do a force quit. I also found that changing the search provider to Bing, will allow me to open links in web searches. The problem even happens in Chrome if you have Google as your default search engine. I am relieved to know that I am not crazy and this is indeed a serious problem. I was just about to restore my phone again and saw this thread and realized it's not worth it since I will have the same problem again until we find out what is causing it. It's not just an iOS 9.3 issue since the last restore I performed, I didn't install the 9.3 Beta and the problem happened on 9.21. I have even tried to disable 3D touch, Javascript and any other "extra" and that doesn't fix the issue. Meanwhile, my iPad Air ran every beta and has pretty much all of the same apps installed and i've never seen this issue on there. I am at am at a total loss because I have no idea what is causing it.

jfiggy..

Reading your post literally is something I could have typed myself.. every word.

the issue definitely has to do with javascript... If you do a REQUEST DESKTOP SITE for the google search done in the URL one, you get the desktop site and links work.. until you go to a java one.

This is a MESS... Anyone who has been around iOS for a long time knows that there have been maybe a half dozen MAJOR issues over time and the worst thing about this is there is NO correct fix and NO reason it happens.. it just starts to happen. In my case, it fixed itself then broke again.

This is for iOS 9.21 OR 9.3.. Rebooting, turning settings on and off and nothing will solve this problem.

Apple needs to address this.

Same situation here. My iPhone 6S Plus was recently updated to iOS 9.3 Final and the issues persists. I'm rather befuddled how this can be affecting so many users with zero input from any of the Developers. Will reach out and see if I can make any progress with getting this addressed.