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No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

joshua.hu

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Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#221

Post by kernal »

Almondsetat wrote: post #112
ionyun wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple still sells previous phones as lesser, but still not very affordable, models. The iPhone 7 was released in September 2016 and discontinued in September 2019. It is also on iOS 15.8 so presumably also vulnerable to this. That would be about 4 years of security updates. Not the worst but not beating what e.g. Google promises for Pixel phones now.

Apple: proven track record Google: promises you're being disingenuous

>Apple: proven track record >Google: promises

Do you really think the cost of the class action lawsuit and settlement and the bad publicity for not adhering to their 7 years of support would not exponentially exceed the cost of a team of engineers tasked with supporting updates for their Pixel phones?

As for "promises" - why hasn't any other OEM matched or exceeded Google? Apple should have been the first one to step up the very next day.

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#222

Post by CodeWriter23 »

mmsc wrote: post #212
CodeWriter23 wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Welcome to HN, in as gentle a way possible I refute this statement > Apple continues to support nearly-decade-old devices like the iPhone 6S, which and iOS 15.8 is still powering those devices, seemingly with official Apple support, with the latest update from October the 25th, which addressed some security vulnerabilities. With: try to update your Apple Watch with a device running the latest iOS 16

https://ibb.co/fn84p09 This photo was taken the day the blog post was published.

And yet, I am still unable to update my Apple Watch with the latest iOS 16. iOS 17 is now required. iOS 17 is also required to rent a movie on my Apple TV.

So, to the author's assertion that "Apple does a good job supporting old hardware", they may give some security patches but interoperability between current and previous versions is seemingly deliberately broken.

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#223

Post by arcanemachiner »

fouc wrote: post #129
usui wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 4-inch screen size that allows the phone to be used single-handed with ease anywhere on the screen, which I’m using to write this comment right now. It’s uncompromising in battery longevity when considering its size, too. First-gen SE is the best phone Apple ever made. The newer SE are terrible.

As someone that went from 5S to 2016 SE to 2020 SE which is my current phone, I've been very satisfied with the 2020 SE. With each phone I have always taken steps to reduce battery usage, disabled background refresh, and manually turn on low power mode after charging every single time.

Not sure if you're doing it manually from the settings, but you can create a Shortcut that enables low power mode. I have a little icon that I press, but there might be an even better way (automatically trigger on unplug? IDK)

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#224

Post by smoldesu »

999900000999 wrote: post #206
smoldesu wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple straight-up disallows MacOS updates on plenty of Macs that could easily update, too. I'd even argue they're worse than Microsoft about it; I heard about Opencore Legacy Patcher looooong before I knew people were modifying Windows 11 images to get a working install. > you can argue that it's "easy" to install Linux on it In my experience, the average Linux install wizard is less technically involved than the Mac…

Most people don't even know how to install an OS. I wouldn't expect the typical person to be able to do it.

Moot point. Both Microsoft and Apple expected the user to install their own OS in the past, and the world didn't explode because of it. If stuff like UEFI and bootloader unlocking was standard again, OS installation would be easy as plugging in a dongle and rebooting.

Plus, you still haven't touched the central point; tightly coupled software and hardware creates more e-waste. What people do today doesn't matter if they're never presented a serious alternative; if ignorance was a basis for removing functionality there would be nothing left of the modern smartphone.

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#225

Post by traceroute66 »

smoldesu wrote: post #197
traceroute66 wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Is it really bullshit? Lenovo manages hundreds of laptop models via fwupd, and those work just fine after they lose OEM support. I've got a Thinkpad from 2009 that still gets modern Linux patches (to say nothing of my 2006 PowerBook running Arch/Plasma 5). Compared to what Apple makes off hardware and service revenue, the cost of opening iBoot and providing basic firmware support would be almost nothing. It's so econ…

> Compared to what Apple makes off hardware and service revenue

Really I wish people would wake up and stop with this bullshit.

Do the other manufacturers do anywhere near as much R&D as Apple does ? NO ! (2023: Lenovo 2bn vs Apple 29bn).

Do the other manufacturers maintain their own OS across multiple hardware platforms ? NO !

Its easy to sit in your armchair and spout crap about "well, Lenovo does it !". Well, the OS on your Lenovo is Windows or Linux. And the parts in your plastic Lenovo are almost certainly 100% off-the-shelf commodity parts.

Meanwhile Apple's R&D is what brings you, for example, the unmatched Apple Silicon chips, which everyone except the die-hard Apple bashers agree are genuinely industry leading.

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#226

Post by fennecfoxy »

traceroute66 wrote: post #225
smoldesu wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really bullshit? Lenovo manages hundreds of laptop models via fwupd, and those work just fine after they lose OEM support. I've got a Thinkpad from 2009 that still gets modern Linux patches (to say nothing of my 2006 PowerBook running Arch/Plasma 5). Compared to what Apple makes off hardware and service revenue, the cost of opening iBoot and providing basic firmware support would be almost nothing. It's so econ…

> Compared to what Apple makes off hardware and service revenue Really I wish people would wake up and stop with this bullshit. Do the other manufacturers do anywhere near as much R&D as Apple does ? NO ! (2023: Lenovo 2bn vs Apple 29bn). Do the other manufacturers maintain their own OS across multiple hardware platforms ? NO ! Its easy to sit in your armchair and spout crap about "well, Lenovo does it !". Well, the…

Lmao Apple R&D. Don't know what they're spending it on since they almost always adopt technologies that have already been developed + proven in the market.

So Apple Spends 29bn R&D every year, over many years and ends up developing...a really good version of (if not currently the best, sure) version of an ARM chip, a pre-existing architecture with which they are already intensely familiar? Wow, they're sure being real efficient with those funds.

I believe a lot of their performance gains pretty much just come down to larger die size than most ARM CPUs, making an SoC and colocating memory etc all on the same die, wrangling some of TMSC's newest most transistor dense and power efficient nodes. M1 Ultra=114b, 64 core graviton3=55b, hell people are even building stuff like https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2023/everything-ive-learne....

Apple went for a bunch of easy wins tbh. Why doesn't every other computer manufacturer do it? Well Apple is a $1T company; they control so many aspects of their products, OS, software etc so very easy for them to offer this. It would require a concerted effort on the part of so many companies involved in the ecosystems of non-Apple products to make a transition the same way Apple did.

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#227

Post by d3w4s9 »

tjoff wrote: post #209
frizlab wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC the browser is a part of the system because the engine is used everywhere in the system. For a long time in iOS it was WebKit that rendered attributed strings for instance.

FYI that is exactly what Microsoft proclaimed back in the day. Doesn't sound better today does it? At least on Windows they didn't prevent you from installing a different browser.

Windows and Android both come with a "built-in" browser:

Windows still ships Internet Explorer for rendering some old components, although I think they are moving to Edge (chromium) based web view. I can't find a better source right now, but something to start with: https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows11/comments/11n79xc/why_does...

Android has a chromium based WebView that ships with the system and is updated via Play Store: https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/definition/Android...

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#228

Post by d3w4s9 »

andrepd wrote: post #188
blacksoil wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the biggest problem is in the alternative OS. Non-official OSes typically are unstable that I personally find not worth the time given phone is quite important piece of communication. As others have already mentioned, certain lines and brands, such as One Plus, Google Pixels, etc have unlockable bootloader so people are free to install custom OSes.

I've been installing alternative ROMs on my android phones for almost 15 years. Never did I have any stability issues, on the contrary: the community ROMs often did a much better job than the official ones in terms of battery management, etc.

Not trying to contradict what your say, but my experience from a few years ago was:

* If you don't use a super popular model, you would have very few choices for custom ROMs * Often custom ROMs are still at the mercy of original manufacturer for certain hardware support -- e.g. they need to release "base AOSP image" or something like that * Custom ROMs often had random things not working, e.g. NFC not functional or cell/WiFi signal weaker than stock ROM * Some come with certain crappy preinstalled apps. Sure you can remove them, but still annoying * Battling SafetyNet was a cat-and-mouse game which I gave up * Browsing xda-developers forum and following the latest reply of a 10-page, 200-post thread like back in the early 2000s was the only way to get updates of a certain ROM. OTA updates were mostly out of the question * ... and many more added to this

I don't know how much has changed, hopefully a lot. I don't doubt if you have a phone of a popular model, you can find a custom ROM that does not make compromises and is much cleaner and better than the stock ROM. But these days I simply don't have any time for tasking the risk and messing with these things and worry WiFi might not work in some cases.

Re: No new iPhone? No secure iOS: Looking at an unfixed iOS vulnerability

#229

Post by d3w4s9 »

K0nserv wrote: post #150

Apple, in my opinion, does a very good job of supporting old devices. Buying an iPhone and keeping it for 6 years is a great strategy and when amortising the cost of the phone over those 6 years, it's price competitive with Android. I do wish legislators forced Apple and Google to give users a path to install an alternative OS on their device. That would enable old iPhones(and Androids) to have their lifetime extende…

No real change is going to happen. Out of all the mobile phone users out there, likely no more than 0.1% will ever consider installing alternative OS on their phone, even if allowed by law. Just look at the size of the custom ROM community in Android and real world impact.
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