iPhones are suggesting people ‘Check In’ with their exes. Yikes!

Apple iPhones are suggesting that some people contact people they’re associated with, like their exes, as part of its “Check In” feature.

Getty Images; BI illustration

Apple added a new safety feature last year called “Check In.”It’s supposed to let selected people know you’ve arrived somwhere safely.But now people are getting Siri suggestions to do a “Check In” with random contacts, including exes.

One of the nice safety features from last year’s iOS for iPhone was “Check In.” You can set up a Check In to alert a contact when you’ve reached your destination — and they can see your device location. The ideal use is to let your friend or loved one know you got home safely from the bar late at night without having to remember to send a text.

The Check In feature launched last year, but more recently, something strange has been happening. Instead of Check Ins only being set up manually, people are getting suggestions popping up on their iPhone screens to remind them to set up a Check In — with random contacts, like exes and bosses.

Some people are getting “Check In” suggestions on their iPhones.

Business Insider

Sometimes, these suggestions are confusing: Why tell my sister I arrived home from work? And sometimes, they’re just plain awkward.

On Reddit’s r/iPhone board, someone said their phone recently suggested they do a Check In with their ex — and this person couldn’t figure out why. Someone else followed up with a similar horror story: “Just happened to me too. We’ve been no-contact, she lives hundreds of miles away, and we haven’t been sharing locations in months. I somehow accidentally accepted the check-in. I threw up lmao.”

On another device forum, someone reported: “I was using my iPhone 13 Pro Max, and out of nowhere, Siri suggested that I start a Check In with my ex. The thing is, we’re currently no-contact, and this has never happened with any of my other contacts.”

Over on Apple’s user support forums, people are similarly stumped about the logic behind who is suggested in the Siri alerts for Check Ins. They’re also trying to figure out how to disable the suggestions.

“Did you ever get a fix for this? Mine has just started and recommended I share my location with my older male boss, and, yeah, I can’t see a single thing in any of the settings to turn it off,” wrote one forum poster.

Apple didn’t respond to questions from BI about what leads to a suggested contact for a Check In — or how to turn it off. And despite my best efforts, I couldn’t find a good answer for how to turn off these Check Ins without turning off all Siri suggestions in iOS18.

Most of the suggestions are actually fairly reasonable: Siri suggesting you check in with a spouse or sibling.

Kylie Robison, a reporter at The Verge, noticed she had been getting these suggestions to Check In with her mother when she got home after midnight. “My mom was not my emergency contact,” she told Business Insider. “I do text her a lot, but probably not the most out of any contact?” Robison is still confused about why an adult who doesn’t live with her mother is getting suggestions that she text her mom at 1:30 a.m.

I’ve never gotten these Check In suggestions, but a friend told me he gets a suggestion to Check In with his friend Max when he bikes near his apartment on his morning commute. But the suggestion isn’t mutual — Max told me he sometimes gets a suggestion to Check In with his upstairs neighbor. (Neither Max nor John get the alert to check in with their wives.)

It doesn’t seem clear what exactly triggers the Check In suggestions. For most people, it’s someone they text with fairly often (or at least have in the past). Other factors, like if you’ve shared a location with someone or your phones have been in physical proximity, may also send a signal to Siri.

It’s possible to turn off “Siri Suggestions” in both Messages and Maps — which might stop this feature. But this would also mean any other helpful Siri suggestions you like would get turned off. If Apple gets back to me with instructions on how to turn this off, I’ll let you know!

And a word of advice: No matter what Siri tells you to do, do NOT text your ex.