Earlier today, a number of iPhone owners were inundated by a series of repeated Apple News push notifications alerting users to CNN's follow-up on Hawaii's false ballistic missile alarm. The news organization has since issued a statement blaming Apple for the mishap.
While only a subset of iPhone users were impacted by the apparent bug, the constantly repeated push notification prompted some to air their complaints on Twitter.
According to user accounts, some saw CNN's headline -- about the firing of the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency employee who triggered an errant ballistic missile alarm two weeks ago -- repeated every seven seconds for a period of about ten minutes.
CNN is able to push breaking news headlines as an approved Apple News partner. These notifications are sent to users who opted in to receive alerts from the news service, as well as other outlets, upon setting up the Apple News app or by toggling push notifications on in the "Following" section.
In a subsequent tweet from CNN Communications, the company said it sent out only one alert, suggesting the problem lies with Apple News.
"We are aware that some Apple News users recently received multiples of the same alert. Our server log shows CNN sent only one. We are working with Apple to identify their issue, as users on CNN-owned platforms did not experience a problem. Apologies to those who did," CNN said.
The irony of the situation was not lost on those who received the repeated notification, an error reminiscent of Hawaii's false ballistic missile alert.
CNN fired off a push notification of the story about the official behind the Hawaiian missile alert mishap being fired, and there's clearly something wrong because I've now received this notification 30+ times. How's that for irony?
-- Evan (@EvanXDuckett) January 30, 2018
As Apple has not commented on the issue, it is unlikely users will find out what exactly happened. While vetted partners like CNN can request Apple News alerts, the tech giant's servers are ultimately responsible for executing platform push notifications.
Update: Apple in a post to Twitter confirmed the issue lies with Apple News.
"We're working to fix an Apple News issue that caused some users to receive duplicate notifications. We apologize for the inconvenience this caused," Apple said.