A tech expert has revealed an iPhone hack that will change the way you send messages forever.
Recent statistics claim that around 23 billion text messages are sent across the globe every day.
As our world increasingly becomes more digital-first, you may have found your phone conversations with friends and business partners have been replaced by sporadic social media messaging instead.
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Due to conducting intimate chats using your Apple or Android devices, you may often find the need to send a copy of your chat to another person.
But what happens if your screenshot of the exchange contains sensitive information?
Well, some people are using the iPhone picture editing tools to simply mark out some of the text so it’s unreadable before sending.
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However, it turns out these ‘blacked out’ messages may not be so secretive after all.
A YouTuber, known by his username SetupSpawn, has recently revealed a method for how you can see blocked-out text on a screenshot.
Taking to the platform, the social media user said: “Did you know if you ever receive a screenshot from someone and they’ve marked out part of it using the highlighter you can actually see what they marked out?”
“All you have to do is edit the picture and set your Exposure to 100 percent. Then go to Brilliance and set that to 100.”
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He then continued to tell his 961,000 Youtube subscribers that they needed to raise their iPhone’s Contrast levels to -100 percent before raising the Brightness to full capacity.
“Finally, Saturation. Set that to 100 and you are done.”
After editing the picture, the tech wizz honed in on the blacked-out text message and showed how easy it was to see underneath the highlighted area.
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“If we zoom in on what they marked out we can actually read what they said.”
As a joke, the star wrote: “Buried Gold I Stole Coordinates. 50.6071° S, 165.9729° E.”
Since posting the clip on YouTube Shorts in December 2023, the ‘hack’ has been viewed over 5.2 million times and many fans have typed the hidden coordinates into Google.
“For anyone who's wondering those coordinates leads to the Disappointment Island,” typed one.
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A second joked: “’We can actually read what they said’. Procceds to dox Rick Astley.”
Regarding the method that SetupSpawn employed to regain the secret information, one user said: “This works because that marker is translucent. Shapes -> Box in plain color, is not translucent however.”
“Pro tip: don’t use the highlighter,” commented another.
“I once received a pdf at work with someone's SSN and date of birth blacked out,” admitted a fifth viewer. “I had Adobe Pro so I just deleted the black rectangles and everything was still there underneath.”