I sent a iMessage to wrong person but was able turn phone off before it was sent. How can I stop phone from sending when powered back on?

Question

I sent a iMessage to wrong person but was able turn phone off before it was sent. How can I stop phone from sending when powered back on?

I sent an iMessage to a client that I meant to send to my assistant 😮. I realized what I did immediately & due to the poor reception in my office, I was able to power my phone down before it went through. Of course, only then did I remember that the only real way to "unsend" a message is to quickly toggle the phone to airplane mode! Is there any way to prevent the text from sending when I power the phone back on?

Note #1 - the original iMessage thread to the client was started from my personal iPhone 6 (Cell #1), which is linked to my work iPhone 6s+ (Cell # 2). However, I sent the accidental iMessage from Work Cell/Cell #2. After quickly turning off Work Cell/Cell #2, I opened up Settings/Messages on Personal Cell/Cell #1, and, under "you can be reached by iMessage at..." I unchecked the number for Work Cell/Cell #2. When I view the iMessage thread from Personal Cell/Cell #1, I can't see the accidental text (thank goodness!).

Note #2 - I would risk turning Work Cell/Cell #2 back on & quickly toggling to airplane mode, but the blue "message status/send progress" bar at the top was ALMOST complete...so I'm not sure how much time I have to try it.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

iPhone 6s Plus, iOS 10.0.1

Posted on Oct 13, 2016 3:48 PM

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Answer 1

Csound1

Level 9

60,063 points

Oct 13, 2016 3:50 PM in response to Margaretdodge

Turn your wireless router off, switch the phone on, delete the text.

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Answer 2

Oct 13, 2016 3:53 PM in response to Csound1

Will it not still send over the cellular network?

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Answer 3

Oct 13, 2016 3:59 PM in response to Margaretdodge

Whether it was sent or not sent, you would see the message in your conversation list. I don't know of any situation where once you have pressed the Send key the message isn't sent. Was it an SMS or an iMessage? Where did you look for it on the device that you sent it from? Did you click on the back arrow at the top left of the screen to go to the conversation list?

If you can find it in the conversation list and it says Not Delivered, you can click on Edit and then delete it.

Best of luck,

GB

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Answer 4

Oct 13, 2016 4:13 PM in response to gail from maine

I'm sure that if I were looking at the conversation list on the phone I used to send the accidental text (which was my work phone), I WOULD see it. But as I said, I turned it off my work phone before the message went completely through. That's why I didn't see it in the conversation list on my personal phone when I checked. The two phones are linked, and the identical conversation list can be viewed from either phone, but of course messages sent from phone #1 only show up in conversation lists on phone #2 if sent successfully.

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Answer 5

Oct 13, 2016 5:12 PM in response to Margaretdodge

As Csound said, turn off your router so you won't get Wifi, and remove your SIM card so you don't have cellular. Then turn on your phone, and you can delete it without it connecting to anything.

Best of luck,

GB

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Answer 6

Oct 13, 2016 6:01 PM in response to gail from maine

Awesome, thanks!

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Answer 7

Oct 13, 2016 6:12 PM in response to Margaretdodge

You are most welcome! 🙂

Best of luck!

GB

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