If you get the “Your Apple ID and phone number are now being used for iMessage on a new iPhone”, it usually means that you added your Apple ID on a new iPhone. If you don’t see it immediately as you sign in, worry not. It might take some time for Apple servers to update new information and send it to your main device. Sometimes Apple ID gets stuck updating so there’s nothing new there. Since the prompt shows the name of the device (e.g. Marry’s iPhone), you can easily determine if you signed into a new device or that was someone else. We expand on it below and explain how to protect your account in the future.
What to do if your Apple ID and phone number are now being used for iMessage and FaceTime on a new iPhone?
This prompt might be problematic if you didn’t log in with any new devices using your Apple ID account. If you did, this is just a completely normal message that informs you that the new iPhone, iPad, Mac, or Apple Watch can send Messages and, on some devices, use FaceTime.
Because it shares the same Apple ID as your iPhone, it syncs Messages and FaceTime e across devices. Luckily, it’s easily recognizable if you are the one who added the device or not because the username appears in the prompt. What you should do, for peace of mind, is to navigate to Settings > Apple ID and check the list of devices.
If you don’t recognize the new device, you can remove it from your Apple ID account. The follow-through is to secure your account. First, enable Two-Factor Authentication if you didn’t already, and then change your Apple ID password. Here’s everything you should do if you see an Apple device that you can’t recognize on the list:
- Open Settings.
- Open your Apple ID account from the top. At the bottom, just above the Sign Out button, you should see all devices under that Apple ID.
- If you can’t recognize a certain device on the list, tap on it and then tap Remove from Account.
- After that, tap Passwords & Security.
- Select Two-Factor Authentication and enable it. Remember that you can’t disable TFA once you enable it. Also, there’s no way to bypass Two-Factor Authentication on iCloud or any other service using your Apple ID.
- Then select Change Password.
- Enter the new password and confirm it. Follow the instructions below and type boxes (8 characters, lowercase, and uppercase, and at least one number must be what you must include in a password).
That should keep all people that somehow got access to your Apple ID out. If you don’t want for text Messages to appear on other devices under the same Apple ID but just the main iPhone itself, navigate to Settings > Messages and disable iMessage on that device. As simple as that.
And, with that said, we can conclude this article. Thank you for reading and don’t forget to share your thoughts in the comments section below. Your feedback is always welcome.
Editor’s note: This article was initially published in August 2022. We made sure to revamp it for freshness and accuracy.
