A flight headed from Tel Aviv, Israel, to Istanbul was postponed for hours after166 passengers on the flight received unsolicited photos of airplane crashes.
Nine people were arrested at the Ben Gurion Airport Tuesday for sending the photos of plane crashes to the passengers of an AndoluJet flight.
The photos were sent to iPhones via the phone’s AirDrop feature which shares files.
According to Reuters, passengers alerted the crew to the shared photos, and authorities conducted a security check of passengers and luggage. The flight took off hours late.
Police arrested nine passengers in connection to the stunt. The nine could be prosecuted for disseminating false information, according to Israeli authorities.
A spokesman for the Israel Airports Authority told Reuters that the incident was not a cyberattack. Those who sent the photos did not have to have the phone number of the phones in order to send the photos. Apple devices can send files to strangers located within 30 feet if the phone’s AirDrop feature is set to receive files from “Everyone.”
It is not the first time an AirDrop incident caused a panic.
Last July, a teenager AirDropped a threat to passengers leaving San Francisco International Airport. Several passengers received an unsolicited photo of a gun on their iPhones.
According to the Hebrew Ynet news site, the pictures included a Turkish Airlines plane which crashed in the Netherlands in 2009 and another in the US in 2013.
A flight from Israel to Turkey had to be aborted after passengers were sent chilling pictures of plane crashes.
— UNILAD (@UNILAD) May 10, 2022
After a panic broke out, the pilot made the decision to return to the terminal. pic.twitter.com/8icwWkHjJG
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