In today’s Bulldog roundup of tech news: study shows online video advertising revenue doubled over three years; Netflix projected to have 100 million subscribers by 2020; a tiny text string can disable iPhones, Snapchat IPO plans.

Global online video ad revenue doubled to $112 billion from 2011 to 2014 and will rise to $13.8 billion in 2015, according to Ireland-based market research and tech consultants at IHS Technology.

In a white paper, IHS said online video services grew significantly as linear TV viewing declines. YouTube, for instance, had a 50 percent increase in hours watched, year over year, attracting more ad revenue. It had $4.2 billion in ad revenue in 2014, a double digit increase over 2013.

The report suggests that Facebook has one of the strongest video strategies, working with premium publishers to distribute content and providing formatting and targeting capabilities. “Despite its late start into video, Facebook will be a significant threat to online video publishers for ad revenue,” said Eleni Marouli, a senior analyst at IHS Technology, in a news release. “We forecast it will account for 25.7% of all online video ad revenue by 2018.” (https://technology.ihs.com/).

By 2017, online video advertising revenue will hit $19 million, eating into TV ad budgets in some markets.

Netflix to top 100 million subscribers

Netflix is headed for more than 100 million subscribers globally by 2020 with revenues of nearly $7 billion in the U.S. and $10 billion globally, according to New York firm Cowen and Company.

Netflix had 20.8 million subscribers in 2014, so reaching 100 million plus by 2020 would be a five-fold increase over five years.

The biggest gains are expected in Europe, which will zoom from about 8.5 million in 2015 t6o 38.1 million by 2020.

String of text characters in Messages can lock you out of iPhone

The Verge reports that Apple device owners may get locked out of their Messages app on an iPhone when they receive a string of text characters.

When the text is received in messages, it locks people out of the app and sometimes crashes the phone.

In some cases, users who receive the text string can’t return to Messages without crashing the app, while others lose the ability to open it entirely.

If the sender of the text string sends another message it will unlock the app, The Verge notes that Twitter is awash with stories of people who won’t send the follow-up message.

CNN Money reports that the app comes back on about 15 seconds after a crash. It says a hack discovered by the users of Reddit says you can escape the freeze by using the Photos app to send a text message then, in iMessage, you erase the conversation. Apple will provide a fix, CNN says. (See: http://money.cnn.com/2015/05/27/technology/iphone-text-message-hack/index.html?iid=Lead).

It doesn’t matter if the text is sent via Apple Messages or SMS.

In some cases, Mac owners can also undo the damage. See: http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/27/8665181/iphone-messages-disabled-by-text-string.

Snapchat planning for IPO

Tuesday, Evan Spiegel, founder and CEO of Snapchat, disclosed the company is planning for an initial public offering of stock.

At the annual ReCode conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, CA, he said, “We need to IPO. We have a plan to do that.” He added that the company is not interested takeover offers because Snapchat should stay independent.

The company closed a $485 million funding round in December and in February, reports said the company was hoping to raise another $500 million. The company was valued at $10 billion in December, CB Insights said.

Spiegel didn’t give any timing for the planned IPO.