Honestly, I just made an account so I can respond to this thread. I’ve been having the same issue amongst all my devices, apple support called me back last night saying that they’ve received multiple reports of the issue and they’ve escalated my case to the apple engineers. I’m really hoping that they come up with a fix soon cause I virtually can’t do anything, can’t even set up my homepod and airtags since they need keychain enabled or access HomeKit accessories. But yeah, just glad that I found this thread and I’m not alone
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iCloud HELP! Got locked out of my iCloud Keychain!
- Thread starter ivanpasic
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Not under the best of circumstances, but welcome to the forums.
I used "cue@apple.com" which was pretty difficult to find... hopefully that's the right address.
Me too!
@movieator @jprez1980 anyone has any connection with MacRumors? I wonder if they can do an article on this? I feel many more people would come forward!
I don’t have any connection with anyone in particular. Maybe @arn can get eyes on this?
I was supposed to hear back from Apple at noon. I know it’s not going to be exactly noon, so I’ll give it until 2:00 before I call them.
When my iCloud calendar went down, Apple's system status said iCloud calendars were fully operational. Then Apple support said that there was nothing wrong with iCloud calendars. It took a full day for them to actually acknowledge it and change the system status page to reflect the issue. So annoying
Ok. So after an hour and a half of waiting for my scheduled call, I decided to call Apple regarding this case. The advisor I spoke to this time could not get a hold of the specialist who said, and I quote, is “taking ownership of this case”.
This advisor was trying to be helpful but I didn’t feel like going through the exact same rigamarole of explanation that I went through on Tuesday.
Suffice to say, I replied to my initial email to Tim Cook’s office with this update.
Gotta say, I’m disappointed.
This advisor was trying to be helpful but I didn’t feel like going through the exact same rigamarole of explanation that I went through on Tuesday.
Suffice to say, I replied to my initial email to Tim Cook’s office with this update.
Gotta say, I’m disappointed.
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I sent two emails to the specialist who took the ownership of my case. No response.
Hopefully you have better luck, please keep us posted.
I sent a video showing the constant requests for updating Apple ID, toggling on keychain only for it to turn right back off, etc. Also had to install a profile so they could obtain advanced logging and all that was submitted on Monday. Support hasn't' been very confidence inspiring.
I had to dust off the macrumors login to respond. I've had this issue for a week. I've had numerous, long calls with Apple and my update today was folks on engineering were "stumped".
Yesterday, we held a 2 hour session of grabbing logs from all of my apple devices (2 iPad pros, 1 iPhone, 1 Mac mini, 1 iMac Pro, 1 MacBook Air) and screen recordings. We installed a profile on each device while I reproduced this issue.
What really sucks, is I just replaced our Ring cameras with all Logitech Circle cams so those have been useless. Having changed my Apple ID as part of troubleshooting further sucks because now all my HomePods are locked out.
Anyway, I offered to have my iCloud wiped out if needed. Downloaded all my photos and docs. Hopefully we get a resolution soon!
Yesterday, we held a 2 hour session of grabbing logs from all of my apple devices (2 iPad pros, 1 iPhone, 1 Mac mini, 1 iMac Pro, 1 MacBook Air) and screen recordings. We installed a profile on each device while I reproduced this issue.
What really sucks, is I just replaced our Ring cameras with all Logitech Circle cams so those have been useless. Having changed my Apple ID as part of troubleshooting further sucks because now all my HomePods are locked out.
Anyway, I offered to have my iCloud wiped out if needed. Downloaded all my photos and docs. Hopefully we get a resolution soon!
The number of users which report this issue keeps increasing. I am disappointed MacRumors has not featured it as a story. Cenrtainly worth looking into. Good luck
I had another call with support. No solution in sight. By the looks of it the number of users reporting this issue is increasing.
Yeah sometimes what you can't fix in 10 years, bad press can fix in 15 minutes.
PS: Oh, MacRumors if you are doing an article on this please tell Tim Apple to fix iCloud tabs. There are two tabs that I have closed for months but still stuck on the list. ty
I managed to fix the issue..no thanks to Apple. I have no idea if this will work for anyone else, and I obviously take no responsibility for any of my own actions should you choose to follow them. My working theory was that if I could get a device to allow me to reset my end-to-end, I might make it out of the loop.
Big Sur would never give me the option to reset my data, so I figured I might as well try something stupid. I was at the point I didn't give a damn if I lost all of my messages and passwords.
Here's what I did:
1) Drank whiskey (may or may not help)
2) Wiped my laptop and my phone, and ensured both were removed from my account through appleid.apple.com
3) Downgraded my MacBook Pro to Catalina (fresh install through internet recovery) and signed into iCloud during setup
4) Same issue presented itself, so I continued to smash that Keychain button
5) Went on an endless aggravating loop of entering passwords over and over again--but it was at least consistently asking me to enter passwords in a predictable and repetitive fashion (unlike on my iPhone and Big Sur).
6) Drank more whiskey
7) Eventually, out of sheer aggravation, hit "Forgot Password" on the "third" password request (the one protecting your encrypted data) and I was finally presented with the option to "approve from other device" (there were none LOL). Forget that mess. Some more clicking around, and I had the option to reset my encrypted data. I smashed that reset button and watched as my computer locked up and crashed. Repeated several times and it finally went through.
8) Laptop appeared to be syncing with keychain, messages, etc. Several minutes of disbelief that something so dumb would/could actually work
9) Set up iPhone and everything worked perfectly.
10) Wiped laptop (again) and set it up fresh on Big Sur. Everything worked perfectly.
11) Pounded on my chest and declared "I AM ALL THAT IS MAN!" before my girlfriend told me to shut up and go to bed
Here's the kicker--it didn't erase anything. I have all of my messages, all of my passwords, and everything is completely intact. I expected it to be erased entirely and, quite frankly, I was OK with that outcome. So far, everything has been working as it should be (and was).
Happy hunting--hopefully this helps someone else out.
Big Sur would never give me the option to reset my data, so I figured I might as well try something stupid. I was at the point I didn't give a damn if I lost all of my messages and passwords.
Here's what I did:
1) Drank whiskey (may or may not help)
2) Wiped my laptop and my phone, and ensured both were removed from my account through appleid.apple.com
3) Downgraded my MacBook Pro to Catalina (fresh install through internet recovery) and signed into iCloud during setup
4) Same issue presented itself, so I continued to smash that Keychain button
5) Went on an endless aggravating loop of entering passwords over and over again--but it was at least consistently asking me to enter passwords in a predictable and repetitive fashion (unlike on my iPhone and Big Sur).
6) Drank more whiskey
7) Eventually, out of sheer aggravation, hit "Forgot Password" on the "third" password request (the one protecting your encrypted data) and I was finally presented with the option to "approve from other device" (there were none LOL). Forget that mess. Some more clicking around, and I had the option to reset my encrypted data. I smashed that reset button and watched as my computer locked up and crashed. Repeated several times and it finally went through.
8) Laptop appeared to be syncing with keychain, messages, etc. Several minutes of disbelief that something so dumb would/could actually work
9) Set up iPhone and everything worked perfectly.
10) Wiped laptop (again) and set it up fresh on Big Sur. Everything worked perfectly.
11) Pounded on my chest and declared "I AM ALL THAT IS MAN!" before my girlfriend told me to shut up and go to bed
Here's the kicker--it didn't erase anything. I have all of my messages, all of my passwords, and everything is completely intact. I expected it to be erased entirely and, quite frankly, I was OK with that outcome. So far, everything has been working as it should be (and was).
Happy hunting--hopefully this helps someone else out.
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@movieator are you brave enough to try this?
@internetrando do you think I have to be on Catalina for that? Can I not just hit forgot password on Big Sur or Monterey?
Several hours between all the wipes, installs, and button smashing. If I re-did it right now (knowing what worked), it would probably take me an hour--maybe less if my internet cooperates. Most of that time is eaten up with wiping and internet recovery.
It is the only thing that worked for me. Big Sur never allowed me to enter my password when I hit "Update Apple ID Settings". Just a spinning wheel like it was doing something and then it disappeared. I only got consistent requests to enter passwords on Catalina.
I do get the option to enter my password when I try to enable keychain, I tried clicking on 'forgot my password' then I get the option to reset it. Should I reset my password this way? Or did you immediately get an option to 'approve from other device'?
UPDATE: Tried this method on Monterey. Selected 'forgot my password' hen 'reset my password'. It asked me for my computer password which I entered. Then I entered my new password twice. It accepted it. Never asked me ti approve anything from another device. Problem still persists.
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That will only reset your Apple ID password. On Big Sur (and iPhone 14.7.1), it would never ask me for my password--it just showed a spinning wheel and disappeared (before appearing again).
While on Catalina, it would first ask me for my Apple ID password (entered), Mac log-in (entered), and a third that would ask for the password that protected the end-to-end encrypted data. It is this third one that I chose "Forgot Password", and was able to navigate my way to reset the end-to-end encrypted data. Catalina consistently and predictably asked for the same passwords in succession. If memory serves, I had to go through four or five crashes/restarts after hitting Reset Encrypted Data before it finally took. If this is the route you go, be patient and keep trying.
I spent hours trying different things, grew older than I wanted to with Apple Support, and the steps I posted above are what worked for me. I cannot stress enough that I have no idea if this will work for anyone else--and I cannot say that your data will preserved like mine was--I can only say that it worked for me.
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Hmm. Let me look at my weekend plans.
Did you lose any data? Passwords, messages, etc?