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The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

forbes.com

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Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#131

Post by athenot »

jsjohnst wrote: post #102
tinus_hn wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These devices allow you to perform a brute force attack. Jailbreak requires a reboot of the device and after a reboot the encryption key for the useful data on the device is not available. If the device uses a strong passcode (as opposed to a numeric code) it cannot practically be brute forced even if you force the device to allow you to enter many attempts quickly.

This is exactly why I use an XKCD style multi-word password for my phone. TouchID/FaceID keep me from having to enter it a lot and the rapid pressing of the power button to disable it give me convenience without significant compromise.

Good but do throw a random character in there, otherwise your passphrase is essentically a few characters long in a (larger) alphabet—ie, a dictionary sorted by most frequently used words. Or at least use some uncommon words.

    70^8   = 576480100000000   // 8 chars of upper/lower case, numbers, symbols
    4000^4 = 256000000000000   // 4 words pulled from a vocabulary of 4000 words

    word          rank
    ------------- ----
    correct       1808
    horse         1286
    battery       3221
    staple        (not in the first 4000)
https://xkcd.com/936/ (For those who were wondering about the context.)

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#132

Post by veidr »

Chriky wrote: post #112
TylerE wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or they just do parallel construction. They gather the evidence illegally, and the conjure up a legal means to re-find the evidence they already know exists.

What here is illegally gathered?

Nothing, if they have a warrant (or equivalent legal authorization).

But the reason most of us care about having our data encrypted is not actually because we are committing heinous felonies, and want our phones to hide the evidence from legitimate cops (though of course sometimes that’s the case).

It’s because we don’t trust the authorities to follow the law. If they can crack your phone legally, they can also crack it illegally. (Say, after seizing it within 100 miles of the border, which they can do any time they please for whatever reason (including no real reason)).

So even though this ability isn’t necessarily illegal in and of itself, it’s certainly of interest to those of us who are concerned about the threat vectors that are presented by government forces that do engage in illegal practices.

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#133

Post by veidr »

rayiner wrote: post #128
cryoshon wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>implying the government asks for a warrant for many of their invasive activities they don't play by their own set of rules.

Ah yes, the old “government does X, so i’m going to speculate it also does Y, and it’s up to you to prove otherwise” trick. Arguing on the Internet is so much fun when we get to just make things up.

Come on now, there are literally thousands and thousands of thoroughly documented cases of law enforcement and government agencies violating the law.

The Israel == Guantanamo thing doesn't exactly make sense to me either, but now you're arguing nonsense. Certainly, we all know that the government, including law enforcement, doesn't always follow the law.

That's almost the entire argument for putting any limits on governmental power at all.

(That's not to say we should restrict them from doing this, though; if they can crack a phone, good for them, I suppose. But it's another thing to be concerned about.)

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#134

Post by veidr »

rayiner wrote: post #127
wu-ikkyu wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know what it's being used for?

The iPhone hacks by their nature require having custody of the physical cell phone for an extended period of time. As far as I know, the government isn’t stealing peoples iPhones to search them.

> As far as I know, the government isn’t stealing peoples iPhones to search them.

Well, OK, now you know:

The US government seizes phones and laptops, "without showing reasonable suspicion of a crime or getting a judge’s approval", on a regular basis, and has done so for a number of years.

https://www.politico.com/story/2013/09/laptop-seizure-border...

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/03/16/canadian_privacy_co...

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/13/technology/aclu-border-pa...

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-25458533

(et fuckin' cetera...)

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#135

Post by jsjohnst »

mrweasel wrote: post #110
jsjohnst wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> global DNS cache No such thing exists > If you don't do a lookup every X days, it'll expire from the cache Requerying a cached DNS record doesn’t extend its TTL. TTL is based on when it was first added to the cache.

You're not wrong, but it has been shown that you can store small amounts of data in open resolving dns servers. https://github.com/benjojo/dnsfs

That's definitely true and I didn't dispute that part, I focused on the parts which were factually not correct.

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#136

Post by jsjohnst »

athenot wrote: post #131
jsjohnst wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly why I use an XKCD style multi-word password for my phone. TouchID/FaceID keep me from having to enter it a lot and the rapid pressing of the power button to disable it give me convenience without significant compromise.

Good but do throw a random character in there, otherwise your passphrase is essentically a few characters long in a (larger) alphabet—ie, a dictionary sorted by most frequently used words. Or at least use some uncommon words. 70^8 = 576480100000000 // 8 chars of upper/lower case, numbers, symbols 4000^4 = 256000000000000 // 4 words pulled from a vocabulary of 4000 words word rank ------------- ---- correct 1808 horse…

> Good but do throw a random character in there

There is, but that part isn't the important part. The important part is using a long pass phrase rather than a multi digit number.

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#137

Post by dogma1138 »

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #98
dogma1138 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The DMCA is applicable in Israel via the bilateral trade agreement with the US.

The DMCA is not concerned with the security of Apple’s devices or “Secure Enclave” as Apple never said they existed for the sake of protecting copyright - that’s iTMS’s DRM which is entirely unrelated.

I didn’t said it was applicable in this case however US copyright laws are enforced over most of the world in one way or another via the trade agreements basically any deal that the US signs has a clause about respecting US copyright and a mechanism through which to seek grievances.

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#138

Post by dogma1138 »

QGmLe wrote: post #117
dogma1138 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

About 10% of the defense budget or 1% of GDP is US military aid that can be spent only on US military hardware.

Err, Facts can't be made up.

? Israel defense budget is about 20 billion these days the military aid to Israel is about 2.5 billion without special congressional allowances. Israel’s GDP is ~320 or so billion.

And if you wondering about the reason for discrepancies from the article above it's because that one is from 2012 the budget is larger and the US dollar devaluation against the Israeli Shekel by 15% since then, in fact fluctuations of the US Foreign Military Financing (FMF) as portion of the Israeli Defense budget are often due to currency exchange as much of the Israeli budget allocated in local currency is spent locally while the FMF is spent over in the US in dollars.

It's also important to note that the Israeli allocation of the budget does not include FMF or any other aid so when Israel allocates say 18 billion USD equivalent in local currency in the budget that is the amount to which the government will fund the defense ministry, beyond that the defense ministry has it's own internal budget which is funded via the Israeli government budget, FMF as well as any additional revenue streams of defense ministry such as rent, dividends from it's share of now privatized national defense contractors like IWI (form Israeli Military Industries) and IAI etc.

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#139

Post by zingmars »

Bitcoin_McPonzi wrote: post #115
andyjohnson0 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to Businessweek [1] in 2012, the Israeli defence budget was approx. $15 billion per year and US military aid was $3.07 billion per year. [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-how-much-america-really...

For some reason, the Powers that Be at YCombinator allow unabated criticism of Israel, even if it's based on completely made-up facts.

I have enough trust in the HN community that they would be able to call out falsehoods and downvote comments that are factually incorrect.

Why would the moderators get involved anyway? Should they also moderate criticism of Russia whether right or wrong? of North Korea?

Re: The Feds Can Now Probably Unlock Every iPhone Model

#140

Post by chapill »

zbentley wrote: post #124
chapill wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one at Apple would share source code? You never heard of iBoot.

That's not really the strongest interpretation of GP's statement. It wasn't implying that nobody would ever share source code for any reason, but that the company would deliberately decide to share source code in order to obtain fly-by-night compliance with government requests while maintaining its public image.

That happens all the time too, and I'm sure Apple is no exception. Want to score that big NSA storage contract? Pony up your HDD firmware... for "security assurances." Suddenly, NSA has exploits for all 7 major HDD manufacturers.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/nsa-hid-spying-software-in...

Hmm, how did Apple get cleared for DOD use?

http://www.zdnet.com/article/iphones-ipads-cleared-for-u-s-m...

What process would be required for that? Hmmmm.

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