Bluetooth pairing problem with iOS

[alireza sadeghpour]

Hi,

I am developing a product, based on nrf52840 soc with SDK v15.3 and softdevice V14. I have a pairing problem with the recently released iOS, version14. while my product works well with older iOS versions and all android devices.

The problem is in this manner that, my device sends a pairing request to the iOS14 but iOS doesn't respond to the request and the request encounter with a timeout. the same problem occurs when I try to pair with iOS14 with the nrfConnect desktop version (which uses PCA10056 as a BLE adaptor).

But I could pair iOS14 with the nrfConnect android version and windows BLE interface.

i have attached the sniffer log for 

1) My product fails to pair with iOS14. ->  3187.ios_pair_failure.pcapng

2) Windows pairs successfully with iOS14. ->8372.ios_pair_success_windows.pcapng

Could anyone help me to solve the problem?

thanks

[Simonr]

I had not tested it with an iOS v14 device, as I didn't have one easily available. I wasn't aware that we didn't support the signature or link key either. I got my hands on an iOS device however, and I can confirm that this can be recreated on our side as well. I have reported this internally and we're looking into it, but as of yet, we don't have a workaround. It does indeed seem like iOS v14 requires signature or link keys (or both) in order to successfully pair and bond with a central device, and we're looking at potential workarounds.

I will update you as soon as I know something.

Best regards, Simon

[alireza sadeghpour]

Thank you so much,

Yesterday Apple released a new update for iOS which I've installed today (iOS14.2 beta2). it seems that after installing it the problem was solved and it pairs with our product as it did in iOS13.

as it is a beta release, maybe apple commits it to the stable version, maybe not.

Anyway, I will be very grateful if you update us with a workaround to change key distribution options.

Best regards

Alireza