What are Rapid Security Response Updates for iPhone and How to Disable Them?
Apple has released a new kind of emergency updates called “Rapid Security Responses” (RSR) to iPhone, iPad and Mac. These updates are installed automatically in Apple devices. If you want to learn more about these updates and how to disable them in your Apple device, this article will help you.
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Apple Releases Rapid Security Response Updates for iOS, iPadOS and macOS
On May 01, 2023, Apple released a new type of software update labelled as “Rapid Security Response” for iOS 16.4.1, iPadOS 16.4.1 and macOS Ventura 13.3.1 operating systems. All Apple devices having these latest versions of iOS, iPadOS and macOS are receiving the update. Devices having older versions of iOS, iPadOS and macOS will not receive Rapid Security Response update.
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Unable to Verify Security Response Error Message While Installing Update
As you can see in the above screenshot, many Apple iPhone users received following error message while trying to install the new Rapid Security Response update in their device:
Unable to Verify Security Response
iOS Security Response 16.4.1 (a) failed verification because you are no longer connected to the Internet.
[Retry] [Remind Me Later]
The iPhone or iPad device was connected to Internet but still the device was displaying this error message.
The error message occurs if the user tries to install the update manually. The Rapid Security Response update has been developed to install automatically and the update rolls out in phases within 48 hours. If a user tries to install the update manually before the update is actually allowed by Apple servers to install on the device, the user receives above mentioned error message.
So if you are also getting the above mentioned error message, sit back and wait for a few hours and the update will install successfully in your Apple device.
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What is Rapid Security Response Update for iPhone, iPad and Mac?
This new type of update can be considered as an emergency update released to fix urgent security issues and vulnerabilities which need to be patched immediately.
According to Apple’s official announcement:
Rapid Security Responses are a new type of software release for iPhone, iPad, and Mac. They deliver important security improvements between software updates – for example, improvements to the Safari web browser, the WebKit framework stack, or other critical system libraries. They may also be used to mitigate some security issues more quickly, such as issues that might have been exploited or reported to exist in the wild.
Rapid Security Responses are delivered only for the latest version of iOS, iPadOS and macOS – beginning with iOS 16.4.1, iPadOS 16.4.1, and macOS 13.3.1.
When a Rapid Security Response has been applied, a letter appears after the software version number, as in this example: macOS 13.3.1 (a).
So Rapid Security Response updates can be considered as Over-The-Air (OTA) updates which will help Apple to provide urgent security patches and hotfixes quickly without having to wait for the full OS update release. These new updates will keep Apple devices safe and secure by installing important security fixes instantly.
When a Rapid Security Response update is installed in an Apple device, it doesn’t increase the OS version number but adds an alphabet such as a, b, c, etc to the existing OS version number to indicate that a Rapid Security Response update has been applied to the OS.
How to Disable Rapid Security Response Updates in iPhone?
By default, Apple devices allow Rapid Security Responses to be applied automatically. You should also keep the updates enabled as they are released to patch security issues.
If you still want to disable these new type of updates in your iPhone, iPad or Mac device, you can do as following:
In your iPhone or iPad, go to Settings -> General -> Software Update -> Automatic Updates page and turn off “Security Responses & System Files” toggle option.
On Mac device, select Apple menu -> System Settings option. Now click on General section in left sidebar and then click on Software Update option given on right-side. Click on the (i) (Show Details) button given next to Automatic Updates option and disable “Install Security Responses and system files” option.
If you turn off the above mentioned setting and not install Rapid Security Responses, your Apple device will receive relevant fixes or mitigations when they’re included in next OS software update as usual.
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