stead-fast resolve in the face of security enhancements

as you well know if you've read this blog for any length of time, i am an apple loyalist. the computers in this house are macs, our phones are iPhones, we frequently wrestle for possession of our iPad. i prefer iWork over office and i use iPhoto to manage my many photos. our music is in iTunes. we are thoroughly apple-ified in this house.

so i was very surprised when sabin showed me a strange message on her phone on sunday afternoon when she tried to update some of her apps. it said that my appleID had been disabled and that i needed to go to iForget to get a new password. sabin hadn't made multiple attempts at the password and i had downloaded a free app on friday afternoon, no problem. nothing had, to our knowledge, happened to our account in the approximately 48 hours between my download and her attempted update.

i dutifully tried to get a new password via iForget, but oddly, the mail i asked it to send me never came through to my email, even when i checked spam. when i tried the online route, apple informed me that i didn't know my own birthday.

i began to be rather worried at this point, thinking my account must have been hacked. so i tried to call apple. of course, in denmark, they don't man the phones on sunday (apparently danes never have issues with their apple products on sunday), so i reported the issue via an email to the iTunes store. to their credit, and although i got a message saying i'd have an answer within 48 hours, within a couple of hours (late sunday afternoon), i had at least a first-round answer. my problem wasn't solved or explained, but i felt like apple was working on it and was going to keep me updated (every other day, they promised).

tho' it hadn't yet been quite two days, the issue was eating away at me, and i was tired of messages from various apps, telling me there was an update, so i emailed this morning, asking for a status. with all of those apple products in this house that are attached to that apple ID, we have issues with updates, so its unexplained suspension is a problem.

i asked apple to at the very least disassociate the credit card i have attached to the account, so that if it is indeed hacked, i can at least rest easy that no one will be running up a bunch of charges. after about six hours, i got another very polite and apologetic mail (apple apparently understands my frustration, but doesn't really see any reason to do anything about it).

but there were a couple of strange statements in the mail, in fact, i'll quote them directly here: "This is due to our increasing efforts to maximize security on the iTunes Store. Our current stage of operations dictates that we cannot comment on why we are enhancing these various security protocols; we also will not speculate on how long this security enhancement will last. " (impressed by the correct use of the semicolon.)

apparently, my account being disabled is a "security enhancement." and further "We ask that you endure this rather unfortunate circumstance with stead-fast resolve as we really do want you to enjoy the iTunes Store in the safest, most enjoyable ways possible."

apple, my loyalty is, for the first time, wearing a bit thin, even as your grammar and vocabulary impress me.

just lemme do my friggin' updates...