iMessage currently seems to have a bug that can transmit the read receipt even though the feature has been disabled in the settings.
Read receipts are a way to inform the sender that their message has been read by the recipient. When the feature is enabled, the status for the sender changes from "delivered" to "read". However, some people prefer to turn this off. The reasons for this may vary. Anyway. Now reported MacWorld that there is an apparent bug affecting some users.
iMessage Read Receipt: How to Check Your Settings
Some users report that they can still see when messages have been read when read receipts are disabled on their devices. This issue seems to have been a brief one on previous versions of iOS and iPadOS, but with iOS 15, including recent updates, there are increasing reports of settings not matching and other people being notified of the status. At the moment, this is a bug with no fix yet. Some people have found that restarting their iPhone or iPad helps, at least temporarily.
If you want to check your own settings, you can do the following. Open the settings and navigate to the "Messages" section. Now scroll down to "Read receipts". If the button is green, read receipts will be sent. If you don't want this, you have to deactivate the switch - it will be grayed out. It remains unclear how many users are actually affected by the problem. What is certain, however, is that Apple will address the bug in a future update. (Photo by Denys Prykhodov / Bigstockphoto)