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Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

techcrunch.com

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Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#51

Post by amazingman »

Kristine1975 wrote: post #46
headShrinker wrote: post #26

A move like this fits with a more general ideology Apple has been advocating for the last three years. Privacy, security, and ultruism. Tim Cook has put is mark on the company. One of the first things he did was apologize, (for maps) something unheard of in Apple's culture. I haven't drank the cool-aid and Apple has a lot of issues. I do see they however are making attempts at differentiating from the general corpora…

>altruism Then why does Apple avoid paying taxes? Let's not kid ourselves: Apple is a company, and companies are only "altruistic" if they expect that it will help their bottom line.

This is dogmatism. The FBI situation clearly demonstrates that Apple does not only act in the interest of the bottom line.

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#52

Post by newhouseb »

uxp wrote: post #38
newhouseb wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple continues to open source their version of XNU, although there has been an increasing lag between the release of each OS version and the corresponding sources. The latest available sources are from 10.11.2, three minor versions behind. Apple has also shifted to pushing a lot of sensitive/proprietary code into kernel extensions (the new Apple File System being one example), for which they don't release source cod…

Filesystems, by and large, are supposed to be pushed into the kernel (via extension, or direct compilation). I'd hardly say that they've "shifted" into pushing code into their kernel, but that much of what differentiates Apple's XNU kernel vs FreeBSD's Kernel or Linux is what they choose the exclude.

Sorry, I wasn't totally clear. I was talking about shifting functionality _from_the_kernel_ into kernel extensions, not functionality from user space.

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#53

Post by Kristine1975 »

amazingman wrote: post #51
Kristine1975 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>altruism Then why does Apple avoid paying taxes? Let's not kid ourselves: Apple is a company, and companies are only "altruistic" if they expect that it will help their bottom line.

This is dogmatism. The FBI situation clearly demonstrates that Apple does not only act in the interest of the bottom line.

>The FBI situation clearly demonstrates that Apple does not only act in the interest of the bottom line.

I don't think it does as I've explained in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11959074

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#54

Post by gionn »

“The kernel cache doesn’t contain any user info, and by unencrypting it we’re able to optimize the operating system’s performance without compromising security,”

This is probably the only true part of the article, it means that they disabled a kernel feature of cache encryption to speed-up performances.

It has nothing to do with source code nor binaries of the kernel.

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#55

Post by andyjdavis »

nostromo wrote: post #37
hackuser wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know enough about their new ethical approach to say whether it's PR, whether it's just a few well-publicized decisions, or whether it's broad-based and substantial. I'm not saying either way; I just don't know. But it could make me a loyal customer much more than cool design and fashionable cache ever would.

When they took on the FBI I decided that it was more than just vacuous PR. A PR person would bristle at the idea of denying to unlock the phone of a terrorist. It took real cojones for Apple to stand up for privacy at such a time.

>A PR person would bristle at the idea of denying to unlock the phone of a terrorist

Not if they were any good at their job. Very publicly standing up against what many would see as heavy handed government and being seen to defend the rights of the little guy (who happen to be their customers and potential customers) got them an enormous amount of very positive press not just in the US but in many countries. It would have cost them a small fortune to pay for that kind of advertising.

I am not saying that it wasn't a good thing for them to do but I really doubt it was some sort of selfless act that happened over protests from PR.

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#56

Post by tajen »

alsetmusic wrote: post #42
hackuser wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know enough about their new ethical approach to say whether it's PR, whether it's just a few well-publicized decisions, or whether it's broad-based and substantial. I'm not saying either way; I just don't know. But it could make me a loyal customer much more than cool design and fashionable cache ever would.

A couple days after Tim Cook stepped into the CEO position, he reversed a Jobs policy and announced that the company would begin matching employee donations to charities. I considered this a fairly classy and subtle way to signal that he wasn't going to lie down on the job (it had been requested many times on company mailing lists). Source: I was on those lists.

As a French person without the culture of corporate donations, I'm both wondering why it was seen as negative that Apple didn't match? Shouldn't they redirect donations to people they prefer?

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#57

Post by srtjstjsj »

tajen wrote: post #56
alsetmusic wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A couple days after Tim Cook stepped into the CEO position, he reversed a Jobs policy and announced that the company would begin matching employee donations to charities. I considered this a fairly classy and subtle way to signal that he wasn't going to lie down on the job (it had been requested many times on company mailing lists). Source: I was on those lists.

As a French person without the culture of corporate donations, I'm both wondering why it was seen as negative that Apple didn't match? Shouldn't they redirect donations to people they prefer?

It shows management sharing decision-making with employees.

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#58

Post by LeoPanthera »

Kristine1975 wrote: post #46
headShrinker wrote: post #26

A move like this fits with a more general ideology Apple has been advocating for the last three years. Privacy, security, and ultruism. Tim Cook has put is mark on the company. One of the first things he did was apologize, (for maps) something unheard of in Apple's culture. I haven't drank the cool-aid and Apple has a lot of issues. I do see they however are making attempts at differentiating from the general corpora…

>altruism Then why does Apple avoid paying taxes? Let's not kid ourselves: Apple is a company, and companies are only "altruistic" if they expect that it will help their bottom line.

> Then why does Apple avoid paying taxes?

Because they're a publicly traded company who act in the best financial interests of their shareholders. They're not breaking any laws. They're playing the game by following the rules as best they can while maximizing their profits. Any for-profit company that does not do so is suicidal.

If you think what they do is wrong - campaign to fix the laws they are following.

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#59

Post by n42 »

godzillabrennus wrote: post #43
ericmsimons wrote: post #10

Could this be an invitation for researchers to find a backdoor the NSA required Apple to put in there? Or are they just utilizing the crowd to help secure against NSA attacks?

That would make sense. They have been on the offensive for protecting their customers. Trouble is auditing TrueCrypt cost $25k and it took massive rumors of a backdoor to raise that. I'm not sold that auditing this will happen anytime soon.

Slightly off topic; but does anyone have any resources that go into a higher level detail (I'm not very knowledgable of low-level programming type stuff) of how an audit like the one done on TrueCrypt or a hypothetical security audit on the iOS kernel works? How can anyone know with that degree of certainty that software is secure and someone else won't find some exploitable bit?

Re: Apple confirms iOS kernel code left unencrypted intentionally

#60

Post by Kristine1975 »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #58
Kristine1975 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>altruism Then why does Apple avoid paying taxes? Let's not kid ourselves: Apple is a company, and companies are only "altruistic" if they expect that it will help their bottom line.

> Then why does Apple avoid paying taxes? Because they're a publicly traded company who act in the best financial interests of their shareholders. They're not breaking any laws. They're playing the game by following the rules as best they can while maximizing their profits. Any for-profit company that does not do so is suicidal. If you think what they do is wrong - campaign to fix the laws they are following.

So they are not altruistic. That was all I was saying with my rhetorical question.
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