PlayStation 4 consoles are now at risk due to a malicious message being sent out by nefarious gamers. Players who were affected by this attack are now taking it to various social media channels to warn fellow PS4 owners as the message caused their units to go haywire.

Reddit user u/Huntstark was among the first to bring this threat to light. He stated on his post over on the PS4 subreddit that the message containing a set of special characters – once opened using the console – will cause it to seize and end up getting bricked.

The OP stated that he and his team came across with the bug while playing a match in “Rainbow Six: Siege.”

Almost the entire team got bricked

Per Huntstark, one of the players from the opposing team used a dummy account to send the bugged message that eventually bricked their consoles. There’s one of them, though, who was not affected by it as his message settings were put to private. The rest of them had to do a factory reset to finally fix the issue. The Redditor even provided a screenshot of the message that was sent to them.

U/Alejtito from the Destiny subreddit also posted a warning as he too was hit by the glitched message. The Reddit user claims that the attack took place in a competitive match adding that turning off and, on the console, won’t resolve the issue.

Setting messages on private

A moderator from r/PS4 confirmed this system-breaking glitch as he stated that there were already multiple reports about it, adding that these are coming from reputable outlets.

The mod, u/Vilens, even provided a walkthrough on how to set the console’s messages to private:

Settings>Account Management>Privacy Settings>Enter player’s password>Personal Info>Messaging>Set messages to either friends or no one. PS4 owners can also block friend requests as these folks can include this type of messages within that request.

Very much similar

A similar issue irked iPhone owners earlier this year as a bug was discovered within iOS 11 where a certain character – if sent to an iPhone, caused the device to crash. The Verge further explained that the bug will eventually block users from accessing the iOS Messaging app. The publication went on, stating that it can also block other apps such as Outlook for iOS, WhatsApp, Gmail, and even Facebook Messenger.

At the time of writing, Sony has yet to issue an official statement regarding this emerging concern. That said, it is expected that the electronics giant will be issuing new system firmware that will ultimately resolve this bug.
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