San Francisco, Apr 9 (IANS): A Washington DC-based journalist was locked out of his iPad for nearly half a century after his three-year-old toddler tried to use the device with the incorrect password.

"Uh, this looks fake but, alas, it's our iPad today after 3-year-old tried (repeatedly) to unlock. Ideas?" Evan Osnos, a staff writer with New Yorker magazine posted on Twitter.

"That caption accompanied a screenshot of his iPad, which showed an onscreen notice that the personal tablet had been disabled for security reasons.

"The prompt advised Osnos to try again in 25,536,442 minutes. That comes out to 48.59 years, which would indicate Osnos may try and access his iPad again by late 2067," the New York Daily News reported late on Monday.

According to the iPhone-maker's guidelines, users experiencing the problem are advised to restore and update their settings through iTunes. Any data that's not backed up, however, would be irretrievably lost.

"We're still locked out," Osnos was quoted as saying by the New York Daily News.