iCloud reportedly locked a user for their last name

iCloud has had occasional service issues, but its latest issue seems to be very … specific. Actor and author Rachel True complaints iCloud effectively excluded her from their account due to the way her last name was spelled. Apparently her Mac thought the lowercase “true” was a Boolean indicator (true or false), which caused the iCloud software on the computer to seize up. The problem has persisted for more than six months, she said.

True said she spent hours talking to customer service and Apple hasn’t stopped charging her for the service. She could upgrade to the free tier, although she would also lose most of her online storage if she did.

We asked Apple for comment.

This is a rare defect if it functions as described. Even if you share the surname True (or False, for that matter), you will need to enter it in a specific way to reproduce the issue. Nonetheless, this raises the question of how MacOS might confuse a name with a software indicator in the first place. At least it doesn’t seem to respond to direct commands – although you might want to get a name change if your last name is “rm rf”, just to be on the safe side.