Does your iPhone clock keep changing? Here's how to solve it

As an unexpected consequence of the jamming of geolocation systems in Lebanon, your iPhone may have been accidentally changing time in recent weeks. A situation that can have embarrassing consequences, but can easily be resolved by changing your device's default settings.

What causes this problem?

This problem is due to an automatic setting on the iPhone which, by default, synchronizes your phone's time and date with the time zone in which you are located, based on your geolocation. If, as is regularly the case, your position is set to Amman, Jordan, due to jamming attributed to Israel, your phone automatically sets the time to UTC+3, the time zone in which Jordan is located, i.e. one hour ahead of Beirut (UTC+2).

How to resolve it?

To resolve this situation, simply go to your device's Settings, select “General” from the menu, then “Date and Time.” Finally, uncheck the “Set automatically” option, so that this button is grayed out.

So far, no Android smartphone user has reported a similar problem, which may be due to the fact that the default time setting option on this operator is linked to the mobile network and not to geolocation.

In what context?

Jamming or spoofing is one of the many forms of the war that has been going on for over a year between Hezbollah and Israel. Since Oct. 8, 2023, the Lebanese have been experiencing regular disruptions to their geolocation, particularly on Google Maps. This has led to complicated situations, making it impossible to find one's way around on a map and complicating the task of delivery drivers and chauffeur-driven transport services (VTC) such as Uber.

In March, a source from the flight safety administration at Rafik Hariri International Airport (RHIA) told L'Orient-Le Jour that two specific types of interference with signals used by aircraft to orient themselves in the air had been detected recently: “Jamming” and “spoofing.” Jamming refers to the freezing of a GPS signal: It freezes, stops responding and the location is lost. Spoofing, on the other hand, refers to jamming that causes a user to change location.