Sony has fixed the messaging bug that's been crashing PS4s

Sony claims it has fixed a recent issue that's been causing PlayStation 4 consoles to freeze after receiving a message containing unsupported text characters. 

The official support account for PlayStation UK broke the news on Twitter, and explained the exploit wasn't actually bricking consoles, but was instead sending them into a "crash loop" that could be repaired in under five minutes. 

The tweet advises those affected to delete the offending message using the PlayStation mobile app (as some Reddit users had already suggested), go into Safe Mode, and use 'Option 5' to return their consoles back to normal.

Although the support staff at PlayStation UK claim a fix has been put in place, Sony yesterday said it was planning a system software update to resolve the problem, meaning it might still be best to err on the side of caution until a more official statement has materialized.

Update: While the fix mentioned above will help any users already affected by the bug, Sony has now released a firmware patch, 6.02, to address the core issue and prevent systems from falling victim to the crash loop in the future.