You’re setting up your new iPhone or you’ve restored from a backup, and all of a sudden your iPhone begins asking for passwords for other people’s Apple IDs. You don’t even know who these Apple IDs belong to, so why are they showing up on your iPhone? In this article, I’ll explain why other people’s Apple IDs are showing up on your iPhone and explain how to stop your iPhone from asking for the wrong Apple ID.
Why Is My iPhone Asking For Passwords For Apple IDs I Don’t Recognize?
Your iPhone will ask for the wrong Apple ID and password when there are apps, songs, movies, TV shows, or books that were purchased with someone else’s Apple ID. Your iPhone is asking for their Apple ID and password as part of the Apple authorization process.
In other words, there are purchased items on your iPhone that are linked to that person’s Apple ID, and your iPhone won’t let you access them without permission from the person who originally purchased them.
How Do I Know Which Apps, Music, Movies, TV Shows, and Books Have Been Purchased With Someone Else’s Apple ID?
Unfortunately, there’s no easy way to list which items are linked to which Apple IDs. The rule of thumb is that if an app won’t download or a song, movie, or TV show won’t play, it’s most likely linked to another Apple ID. You’ll need to get that person’s password to be able to download it.
How To Stop Your iPhone From Asking For The Wrong Apple ID
If you’ve just restored your iPhone and you’re being prompted for Apple ID passwords that belong to people you don’t know, it’s often easier to set up your iPhone as new instead of going through and trying to weed out every purchase that wasn’t made with your Apple ID. It might seem a bit drastic, but starting fresh might save a serious headache.
To set up your iPhone as new, head to Settings -> General -> Reset and choose ‘Erase All Content and Settings’.
After your iPhone reboots, choose to set up your iPhone as new instead of restoring from an iCloud or iTunes backup. From then on, make sure that you use your personal Apple ID for all purchases.
How To Share Your Apps, Music, Movies, TV Shows, and Books
With the release of iOS 8, Apple introduced a new feature called Family Sharing that allows up to 6 people to share purchases made from iTunes, the App Store, and from iBooks. Apple has created a section about Family Sharing on their website, and their article called “Start or join a family group using Family Sharing” is a great place to start.
Thanks so much for reading and I look forward to hearing your questions and comments below. I’ll do my best to help you out along the way.
All the best,
David P.
10 Comments
What happens if I put the Apple ID password of the person it is asking me for, in the phone? Will it give me all of his apps and data? Will it mess up his Apple device?
It didn’t work. Still can’t access the AppStore. Still shows an email that’s not mine.
Lame, that’s not a fix.
Hi David, i purchased an iphone 6s a few months ago which turned out to be stolen. I posted on numerous sites to try return it to the owner with no such luck. Iv tried to use the phone now as my own, iv restored the whole phone back to basics but on switching the phone on im getting asked for the old users apple id and pass before i even get to home screen. Is there anyway round this?
Help me reset the whole phone an apple Iphone 5s
Help me delete an account in iCloud from apple Iphone 5s
Help me reset and change my apple Iphone 5s user id and password, I am unable to delete it
Hey Daniel,
You should be able to remove an Apple ID from your iPhone in Settings -> iCloud. Just scroll to the bottom and choose ‘Sign Out’. If you want to reset the settings or erase the entire iPhone, you can do so in Settings -> General -> Reset and choose ‘Reset All Settings’ or ‘Erase All Content And Settings’. If you can’t get into the iPhone at all, plug the iPhone to a computer and you should be able to use iTunes to restore the iPhone back to factory settings.
Best of luck and thanks for your question!
David P.
Apple developers are always much more interested in what THEY think is cool than what the customer wants. The trick is to simply accept that your Apple device now does something completely different from what you want it to do. Just get used to doing what APPLE wants you to do- life will be do much easier.
So apple developers making you put in the password for the purchasing account of a copyrighted app is something they just do because they think it’s cool? Im pretty sure its just so that they can protect the app developers copyrighted content. Way to make yourself look stupid while trying to bash apple. Google play store wont let me download apps that i didn’t pay for either is that also because they think its cool?
Sent from my fully customized jailbroken iphone. I also have an acer tablet fully rooted on cyanogenmod. And guess which one has more customized software?