Android Users Experiencing Issues Relating To Wallpaper Picture Which Crashes Phones

Android users have been reporting that a certain picture makes their mobile phones crash when it's used as a wallpaper.

The image, that features a lake with a sunset and trees, is apparently causing problems for different brands, including Samsung and Google's Pixel.

We wouldn't recommend trying it for yourself, as the picture is reportedly causing a bug which makes the screen turn on and off. It can mean that a factory reset is required to remove the image from the phone.

A tweet that warned other Android users about the problem was posted on 31 May, and hundreds have responded to say that they have experienced it too.

The warning post read: "Never set this picture as wallpaper, especially for Samsung mobile phone users! It will cause your phone to crash! Don't try it! If someone sends you this picture, please ignore it."

Others posted photos of their own phones looking worse for wear.

Speaking to the BBC, Ken Munro and Dave Lodge from security firm Pen Test partners explained that it's most likely to do with the colours on the photo.

They said: "As digital photographs have improved in quality, phones need to check what the image 'colour space' is to work out how to display it properly.

"It's how a phone knows how to display exactly the right shade of green, for example.

"There are different ways of defining the colour space. Some spaces have specialist uses in graphic design, so sometimes you'll see images that aren't in the usual 'Standard RGB' format.

"It's also possible to deliberately create images that have more colour information than some devices can handle.

PA

"What's happened here is that the way some phones deal with these cases has gone wrong. The phone crashes because it doesn't know how to deal with it correctly, and the software developers probably hadn't considered this might happen."

It looks like the bug mainly affects some but not all devices that have the latest version of Android operating system, Android 10.

Samsung is rolling out an update to fix the issue on 11 June. LADbible has contacted Google for comment.

Topics: Technology

Amelia Ward

Amelia is a journalist at LADbible. After studying journalism at Liverpool John Moores and Salford Uni (don't ask), she went into PR and then the world of music. After a few years working on festivals and events, she went back to her roots. In her spare time, Amelia likes music, Liverpool FC, and spending good, quality time with her cat, Paul. You can contact Amelia at [email protected].

@ameliasward