After the summer break, the Weekly Tech Reports are back. The first new edition looks at documented anomalies from the week of September 15 to 21, 2025 and also introduces something new: In addition to the German and English versions, the report will now, for the first time, also be published in French. This is intended to make the regularly documented observations more easily accessible to French-speaking readers in the future.
From a technical perspective, the week was primarily marked by several anomalies within the Apple ecosystem, supplemented by problems with digital services as well as recurring limitations affecting Deutsche Bahn infrastructure.
Numbers Between Freezing and a Documented Crash
One of the most noticeable observations involved Apple Numbers. On September 19, a MacBook was connected to the Telekom network via an iPad’s personal 5G hotspot. During this mobile work situation, Numbers froze, making it temporarily impossible to continue working productively.
Two days later, another incident occurred: Numbers crashed completely on a Mac running macOS 15.5. The crash report documented an EXC_BREAKPOINT (SIGTRAP) and included, among other things, the message “Trying to recursively lock an os_unfair_lock”. This means that, for this incident at least, there is concrete technical crash documentation. However, based on the available information, it is not possible to reliably determine whether there is any connection to the previous freeze.
Shared Notes and Brief Display Glitches on iOS
Several anomalies also appeared under iOS 18.6.2. In a shared note, typing correctly remained nearly impossible: During text entry, the cursor jumped to different positions within the same sentence and could not reliably be placed at the end of the text. Especially in collaboratively edited notes, this kind of behavior significantly impairs practical usability.
In addition, an unlocked iPhone briefly displayed white and black areas before the previously open iMessage interface reappeared. The display issue lasted only around a quarter to half a second, but was still clearly noticeable during normal use. No specific technical cause could be derived from the observation.
Siri Once Again Behaves Unexpectedly
Siri also caused some confusion this week. In response to a familiar news command, the voice assistant suddenly played only the ZDF heute Nachrichten, whereas it had previously regularly started content from Deutschlandfunk. Whether Apple had changed the command mapping or whether another cause was responsible remained unclear.
Another incident occurred in combination with the AirPods Pro. While Siri was reading out message reactions, playback suddenly stopped after the user merely blew their nose. Whether the sound or an associated movement was mistakenly interpreted as user interaction has not been verified. What is certain is only that the readout stopped immediately afterward.
In addition, the iPhone being used was once again perceived as unusually warm. Since no objective temperature measurement was available, this can only be described as noticeable warming during practical use, not as evidence of its technical cause.
Digital Services With Unnecessary Obstacles
Outside the Apple ecosystem, a service-related issue with Vodafone stood out. For private customers, the specific contact process being used offered no option to schedule a callback for a fixed appointment. Especially for customers with tightly scheduled workdays, a callback that can only occur spontaneously can make contacting support unnecessarily difficult.
An otherwise straightforward online donation to the German Animal Welfare Association also failed on an iPhone using Safari. The required address fields in the donation form did not load, meaning the process could not be completed on mobile. Whether the cause was Safari, the website itself, or an embedded form service remained unclear.
Broken Elevators Remain an Infrastructure Issue
In addition to digital problems, technical limitations affecting Deutsche Bahn once again came into focus. The elevator relevant to accessing the DB Lounge at Frankfurt Central Station remained out of service. According to available information, replacement parts had to be ordered, delaying the repair.
Only a few days later, another elevator problem appeared at the Frankfurt-Berkersheim S-Bahn station. There, too, an elevator was once again out of service. Such outages are not merely a matter of convenience, but directly affect the reliable and accessible use of public infrastructure.
Conclusion
The first Weekly Tech Report after the summer break once again shows how differently technical problems can surface in everyday life. While Apple software issues ranged from a documented Numbers crash and cursor errors to unexpected Siri behavior, poorly functioning web forms, limited support processes, and broken elevators created additional friction elsewhere.
What many of these observations have in common is that, when viewed individually, they may appear minor, but in everyday use they can have an immediate impact on productivity, accessibility, and the user experience. This is precisely why continuously documenting such anomalies remains worthwhile – including in cases where a clear technical cause cannot initially be verified.
Note: This report is based on documented observations from the period of September 15 to 21, 2025 in Germany. The events described reflect practical user experiences. Where no technical cause could be clearly verified, corresponding causal claims were deliberately avoided.
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