iOS 6.1 update arrives, Apple claims 300m users

 

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By Nicole Kobie

Posted on 29 Jan 2013 at 10:07

Apple has updated iOS to version 6.1, but the refresh offers little that's new for UK users.

Apple said iOS 6.1 extends LTE/4G support to another 36 mobile carriers worldwide - although in the UK, that remains limited to EE, the only operator with 4G at the moment.

Other updates include using Siri to buy movie tickets - in the US only - and fixing iTunes Match integration, allowing individual songs to be downloaded from iCloud to a device after a bug in the previous version.

While the features may not sound particularly exciting, the update also includes a series of security fixes, including one for a certificate authority authentication issue, a series of WebKit bugs, and another that would allow a hacker to temporarily disable Wi-Fi.

Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide marketing, said iOS 6 was already on 300m iPhones, iPads and iPod touches only five months after launch, saying "it may be the most popular new version of an OS in history". While Android is on more devices, Google's mobile OS is more fragmented between versions, and users don't tend to update to new releases as quickly.