Georgia Tech Researchers Jailbreak iOS 7.1.2 136
mikejuk writes The constant war to jailbreak and patch iOS has taken another step in favor of the jailbreakers. Georgia Tech researchers have found a way to jailbreak the current version of iOS. What the Georgia Tech team has discovered is a way to break in by a multi-step attack. After analysing the patches put in place to stop previous attacks, the team worked out a sequence that would jailbreak any modern iPhone. The team stresses the importance of patching all of the threats, and not just closing one vulnerability and assuming that it renders others unusable as an attack method. It is claimed that the hack works with any iOS 7.1.2 using device including the iPhone 5s.
It is worth noting that the The Device Freedom Prize for an open source jailbreak of iOS7 is still unclaimed and stands at just over $30,000. The details are to be revealed at the forthcoming Black Hat USA (August 6 & 7 Las Vegas) in a session titled Exploiting Unpatched iOS Vulnerabilities for Fun and Profit:
It is worth noting that the The Device Freedom Prize for an open source jailbreak of iOS7 is still unclaimed and stands at just over $30,000. The details are to be revealed at the forthcoming Black Hat USA (August 6 & 7 Las Vegas) in a session titled Exploiting Unpatched iOS Vulnerabilities for Fun and Profit:
Why buy a product that you're going to jailbreak? (Score:3, Interesting)
When are people going to stop buying products that they feel the need to jailbreak instead of buying unlocked or open alternatives? Keep rewarding the bad behaviour that you don't like, and you'll just get more of the same, except locked down even better.
Re: Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
Many of them evaluate the file system and determine the device is jailbroken. tsProtector fixes this by denying apps (you choose) file access. Makes apps that get cranky over jail breaking stfu and get back to work.
Re:Why buy a product that you're going to jailbrea (Score:4, Interesting)
As soon as my employer decides to offer a choice other than "windows or IOS", I'll take it.
Until then, jailbreaking remains the only option.
Re:Why buy a product that you're going to jailbrea (Score:4, Interesting)
Because the open alternatives well, suck. I've tried Android, and while ICS and JB are nice, they're also way too busy and don't work the way I want them to. Yes, I'm a geek, I love all the billion options it gives me to control it, but damn, I just want to use my phone as a phone. I don't want or care about themes, dynamic backgrounds, wallpapers, etc.
Plus, I like the way iOS works. Android's got it's own UI, and I find I dislike it (it's gotten a lot better now, but the back button always throws me for a loop because I'm used to seeing back at the top left, while the back button is always at the bottom).
Then there's whole Google thing. Sorry, Google's business plan involves gathering as much user information as possible.
Finally - while iTunes sucks, there's a bunch of utility it provides, like backups. I can download IPA files on iTunes and install them on my iOS devices - even if the app gets banned or whatever, as long as I have a local copy, I can install it. Apple hasn't blocked any apps from running, nor have they force-removed apps. And iTunes backups DO work. Backing up on Android? Well, you have Ti Backup and other apps, but nothing by default. Hell, even iCloud backups work. Android backups for me just mean all my apps get reinstalled, but I lose all my data. Thanks, Google.
Then there's the whole penis^H^H^H^H^Hscreen size thing. I find this enlarging screen size trend disappointing - I want a decent screen, decent CPU, decent RAM, and that entails buying flagships which are growing faster than the American waistline. I mean sure, 441dpi is a bit too much for me (I don't use the phone to my nose), so the 325-ish DPI of the "retina" display is perfectly adequate. Plus, I want real RGB, not pentile crap, and proper color calibration (AMOLED is impressive, but the colors generally oversaturate and are inaccurate). Android is rapidly moving away from being useful to me as an alternative.
Sure if I wanted open I could use Linux, but Linux desktops are just plain old fugly to me. I develop on Linux, using Windows as a front end (X server for the odd X app, but otherwise a bunch of SSH windows and samba serving files for Gvim for Windows).
Again, it's all personal preferences, and I know lots of people don't work that way.
As for jailbreaking, well, the only must-have app I have on iOS is iP Firewall. It lets me control apps use of network - so I block ad servers and the like. (Yes, Android has the same functionality if you root).
Estimates have around 10% of iOS users jailbreak, and unfortunately, it seems the largest use of jailbreaks are... installing pirated apps.