Want to hack into your iPhone?

[Randy W]

An internal 128GB iPhone storage upgrade? Only at the Shenzhen market… [Video]

 

 

The process takes around 30 minutes and sees a Shenzhen market employee taking apart the iPhone and replacing the device’s internal flash storage with a new 128GB chip from Toshiba. And all of the device’s storage is transferred to the new chip, so you don’t lose any data in the process and can continue using the device with everything intact from before the upgrade.

 

 

. . . and allow a few more tries if you've forgotten your password!

[wawster]

Very cool!

. The first time I visited Rose, she took me to the Shenzhen Electronic market, where this video was shot. It was several skyscrapers, with floor upon floor that looked just like this. There were escalators to bring you to each floor, but you never knew which floor you were on – they all looked exactly the same inside. And you could find ANYTHING an electronics guy could want. Connectors, chips, sub-assemblies…anything at all. I was like a kid in a candy store! It's an Electrical Engineer's dream!

[dnoblett]

Yep, I saw that one last week, and this is the suspected technique the FBI is using to hack the San Bernardino Terrorist iPhone. Better this than demanding Apple to build a backdoor into the operating system that could potentially compromise people's private data.

[Randy W]

Yep, I saw that one last week, and this is the suspected technique the FBI is using to hack the San Bernardino Terrorist iPhone. Better this than demanding Apple to build a backdoor into the operating system that could potentially compromise people's private data.

 

 

This IS the backdoor, except generated by a hacking company, instead of being left to Apple. It was NEVER INTENDED to be a permanent operating system modification for ALL iPhones.

 

Apple was never asked to provide a general O/S modification for ALL phones - only one(s) which were in the hands of the FBI.

 

Apple's assistance was never needed for this. Since they refused to deliver, the hack will NOT be under their control.

[dnoblett]

From my own experience at my job, I use hard disk virtualization tech to develop and deploy operating system images into labs. So it is conceivable to use this tech to brute force the iPhone.

 

Simply clone the phone's flash ram essentially a small solid state drive into a virtual disk, and attach a differencing disk to it then have ios boot with this, make several unlock attempts ios will record these attempts in the differencing disk not the clone, once failed attempt limit is reached, wipe the differencing disk and repeat, attempting to unlock using more codes, the original clone remains uneffected.

 

In the virtual computer world this is called taking a snapshot of the virtual disk state, if something gets messed up, simply delete snapshot and take another one, the state from before snapshot is not being changed.

[Randy W]

in the NY Times - who needs 'em? Now it's completely out of Apple's hands.

 

U.S. Says It Has Unlocked iPhone Without Apple

 

Yet law enforcement’s ability to now unlock an iPhone through an alternative method raises new uncertainties, including questions about the strength of security in Apple devices. The development also creates potential for new conflicts between the government and Apple about the method used to open the device and whether that technique will be disclosed. Lawyers for Apple have previously said the company would want to know the procedure used to crack open the smartphone, yet the government might classify the method.

“From a legal standpoint, what happened in the San Bernardino case doesn’t mean the fight is over,” said Esha Bhandari, a staff lawyer at the American Civil Liberties Union. She notes that the government generally goes through a process whereby it decides whether to disclose information about certain vulnerabilities so that manufacturers can patch them.

“I would hope they would give that information to Apple so that it can patch any weaknesses,” she said, “but if the government classifies the tool, that suggests it may not.”

 

Any computer is only as secure as the password - it only requires a few minutes to run through ALL possible combinations within a reasonable number of characters.

[Randy W]

More on the "challenge" faced by Apple, if you're still interested. In my view, a hole of their own digging. It's not hard to understand what they did to hack into the phone, but now the publicity is out that Apple's phones are hack-able - in the public domain.

 

Apple’s New Challenge: Learning How the U.S. Cracked Its iPhone

 

Federal officials have refused to identify the person, or organization, who helped crack the device, and have declined to specify the procedure used to open the iPhone. Apple also cannot obtain the device to reverse-engineer the problem, the way it would in other hacking situations.

 

. . .

 

 

Whether Apple’s security operation will ever obtain information about how the government hacked into Mr. Farook’s iPhone remains unclear.

It’s possible that the government won’t say how it opened the iPhone because the method is “proprietary to the company that helped the F.B.I.,” said Stewart A. Baker, a lawyer at Steptoe & Johnson and the Department of Homeland Security’s first assistant secretary for policy.

Within the security community, researchers and professionals said they were incensed that they — and Apple — may not find out how the F.B.I. was able to crack Mr. Farook’s iPhone.

 

[Greg.D.]

The FBI has no more right to a backdoor into your phone or house than the CCP does, unless we're all living by China's rules now.

 

Any appearance of illegal cooperation by Apple with the FBI (like MS did with the NSA) will harm their competitive stance in the global market. So if it's a hole Apple is in right now, they can be proud to be there.

 

We assume the U.S., Russia and China have ways to intercept our data if they really want it. The fact that the FBI had to make a public pissing match out of it is embarrassing if not worrying.

[tsap seui]

Them sumbitch FBI clowns..wanting to listen in as us civilians talk about what is needed from the grocery store, or what time the soccer game ends and the kids need to be picked up, etc etc. Well, as much as some of us don't like terrorists, even to the horrid point of thinking it is okay for the "good guys" to listen in on their conversations (strike me down for saying that terrible statement), at least those nice bad guys of all colors creed and so called "religions" can continue to plot and plan and carry out their execution plots with their human bombs and AK-47s with the full knowledge that good ol' Apple has their backs covered...NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO Apple will stand firmly behind them.

 

In this day and politically correct times, it is not often that you get someone who will stand behind you. As the suicide bombers and cowardly murderers spiritual and higher power blesses them in their war on us no good infidels (out of fear I am not using their spiritual leader's name), one can only hope that he also blesses good ol' righteous Apple with his goodness.

Edited March 30, 2016 by tsap seui (see edit history)

[Randy W]

That cat is out of the bag!

 

FBI Offers to Help Local Law Enforcement With Locked iPhones

"The FBI will of course consider any tool that might be helpful to our partners"

The FBI said it would try to help local law enforcement agencies to open locked phones and other devices in an advisory on Friday.

 

[Randy W]

Carl posted this on Facebook