What is phobos.apple.com?

[viningc]

Sorry for posting this if it's been posted before (as I'm sure it has!) but when I did a search, the list that was presented was over 2 pages long with no Title indicating just what I was searching for.

Whenever I go into Settings\Safari\Advanced\Website Data\Show All Sites and scroll down far enough, I will see an entire series of entries like a####.phobos.apple.com where the #### ranges from two to four digit numbers. Each entry is only 0.3 KB but there are well over 100 of them and they seem to be multiplying!

From the other entries on the list, it appears they correspond to website cookies.

1. What is phobos.apple.com?
2. Is there any easy way to remove all the entries without also removing everything else?

 

[twerppoet]

Apparently the phobos address is reserved for iTunes store stuff. So it is probably cached data for the various iTunes store pages/products/stuff you've browsed in one of the iStores.

You can delete individual lines by swiping across them and tapping the red Delete button that appears, or by choosing he Edit button at the top right then tapping red minus signs to reveal the Delete button and tapping. The swipe is quicker.

 

[viningc]

... The swipe is quicker.

Thanks for the thoughts. I guess I could call Apple if I really want to know what they are. Too bad there are so many of them. I will try your suggestion on how to delete them. I was using two fingers, one to tap the minus and the other to tap the delete button but that gets old in a hurry too.

I did notice that the "Other" category of usage on my iPad (shown when linked to iTunes) decreased a bit once I'd removed a lot of them.

 

[twerppoet]

I did notice that the "Other" category of usage on my iPad (shown when linked to iTunes) decreased a bit once I'd removed a lot of them.

Interesting. I didn't know that Safari's cache was part of the Other storage. When I have some time I'll play with that for confirmation. That could come in handy in the future.

Thanks!

 

[viningc]

OK, I finally contacted Apple Care and got a straight answer.

... This error may occur because of one of the following conditions:

Access to ports 80 or 443 is blocked.
Communication to albert.apple.com or phobos.apple.com is blocked by a firewall, third-party security software, or other Internet security setting.
The iTunes Store is experiencing extremely high traffic.

 

[twerppoet]

Ok, good to know; though I missed the part about there being an error involved. Thanks for the info.