Apple iPhone | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

Remember the infamous encryption fight between Apple and the FBI for unlocking an iPhone belonging to a terrorist behind the San Bernardino mass shooting that took place two years ago? After Apple refused to help the feds access data on the locked iPhone, the FBI eventually paid over a million dollar to a third-party company for unlocking the shooter's iPhone 5c. Now, it appears that the federal agency will not have to fight Apple over unlocking iPhones since the Israeli mobile forensics firm Cellebrite has reportedly figured out a way to unlock almost any iPhone in the market, including the latest iPhone X. Cellebrite , a major security contractor to the United States law enforcement agencies, claims to have a new hacking tool for unlocking pretty much every iPhone running iOS 11 and older versions, Forbes reports. In its own literature [ PDF ] "Advanced Unlocking and Extraction Services," Cellebrite says its services can break the security of "Apple iO

Only a single character can crash your iPhone and block access to the Messaging app in iOS as well as popular apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Outlook for iOS, and Gmail. First spotted by Italian Blog Mobile World, a potentially new severe bug affects not only iPhones but also a wide range of Apple devices, including iPads, Macs and even Watch OS devices running the latest versions of their operating software. Like previous 'text bomb' bug, the new flaw can easily be exploited by anyone, requiring users to send only a single character from Telugu—a native Indian language spoken by about 70 million people in the country. Once the recipient receives a simple message containing the symbol or typed that symbol into the text editor, the character immediately instigates crashes on iPhones, iPads, Macs, Apple Watches and Apple TVs running Apple's iOS Springboard. Apps that receive the text bomb tries to load the character, but fails and refuses to function prope

It comes as no surprise that today's cyber threats are orders of magnitude more complex than those of the past. And the ever-evolving tactics that attackers use demand the adoption of better, more holistic and consolidated ways to meet this non-stop challenge. Security teams constantly look for ways to reduce risk while improving security posture, but many approaches offer piecemeal solutions – zeroing in on one particular element of the evolving threat landscape challenge – missing the forest for the trees.  In the last few years, Exposure Management has become known as a comprehensive way of reigning in the chaos, giving organizations a true fighting chance to reduce risk and improve posture. In this article I'll cover what Exposure Management is, how it stacks up against some alternative approaches and why building an Exposure Management program should be on  your 2024 to-do list. What is Exposure Management?  Exposure Management is the systematic identification, evaluation,

Why is my iPhone slow? Do you also ask this question again and again? Well, the biggest conspiracy theory floating around from years that Apple deliberately slows down performance on your older iPhones whenever the company is about to launch the next version of its flagship to push its sale is TRUE ( at least partially ). Apple has finally admitted that it does indeed intentionally slow down older iPhone models, without notifying its customers, though the company claims the move is not intended to encourage customers to upgrade to newer iPhone models. Instead, Apple says it is a feature—implemented on the iPhone 6, 6S and SE last year during a software update, and on the iPhone 7 in December with the release of iOS 11.2—to protect against unexpectedly shutting down of older iPhones due to aging batteries and prolong their lifespan. " Last year we released a feature for iPhone 6, iPhone 6s and iPhone SE to smooth out the instantaneous peaks only when needed to prevent

Just a week after Apple released its brand new iPhone X on November 3, a team of hackers has claimed to successfully hack Apple's Face ID facial recognition technology with a mask that costs less than $150. Yes, Apple's "ultra-secure" Face ID security for the iPhone X is not as secure as the company claimed during its launch event in September this year. "Apple engineering teams have even gone and worked with professional mask makers and makeup artists in Hollywood to protect against these attempts to beat Face ID," Apple's senior VP of worldwide marketing Phil Schiller said about Face ID system during the event. "These are actual masks used by the engineering team to train the neural network to protect against them in Face ID." However, the bad news is that researchers from Vietnamese cybersecurity firm Bkav were able to unlock the iPhone X using a mask. Yes, Bkav researchers have a better option than holding it up to your face whi

Are you a proud iPhone owner? If yes, this could freak you up. Trust me! Your iPhone has a serious privacy concern that allows iOS app developers to take your photographs and record your live video using both front and back camera—all without any notification or your consent. This alarming privacy concern in Apple's mobile operating system was highlighted by an Austrian developer and Google engineer, Felix Krause, who detailed the issue in his blog post published Wednesday. The issue, Krause noted, is in the way Apple's software handles camera access. Apparently, there is a legitimate reason for many apps, such as Facebook, WhatsApp, and Snapchat, to request access to your camera, in an effort to take a photo within the app. So, this permissions system is not a bug or a flaw instead it is a feature, and it works exactly in the way Apple has designed it, but Krause said any malicious app could take advantage of this feature to silently record users activities. iPhon

You have now another good reason to update your iPhone to newly released iOS 11—a security vulnerability in iOS 10 and earlier now has a working exploit publicly available. Gal Beniamini, a security researcher with Google Project Zero, has discovered a security vulnerability (CVE-2017-11120) in Apple's iPhone and other devices that use Broadcom Wi-Fi chips and is hell easy to exploit. This flaw is similar to the one Beniamini discovered in the Broadcom WiFi SoC (Software-on-Chip) back in April, and BroadPwn vulnerability disclosed by an Exodus Intelligence researcher Nitay Artenstein, earlier this summer. All flaws allow a remote takeover of smartphones over local Wi-Fi networks. The newly discovered vulnerability, which Apple fixed with its major iOS update released on September 19, could allow hackers to take control over the victim's iPhone remotely. All they need is the iPhone's MAC address or network-port ID. And since obtaining the MAC address of a connec

Millions of smartphones and smart gadgets, including Apple iOS and many Android handsets from various manufacturers, equipped with Broadcom Wifi chips are vulnerable to over-the-air hijacking without any user interaction. Just yesterday, Apple rushed out an emergency iOS 10.3.1 patch update to address a serious bug that could allow an attacker within same Wifi network to remotely execute malicious code on the Broadcom WiFi SoC (Software-on-Chip) used in iPhones, iPads, and iPods. The vulnerability was described as the stack buffer overflow issue and was discovered by Google's Project Zero staffer Gal Beniamini, who today detailed his research on a lengthy blog post , saying the flaw affects not only Apple but all those devices using Broadcom's Wi-Fi stack. Beniamini says this stack buffer overflow issue in the Broadcom firmware code could lead to remote code execution vulnerability, allowing an attacker in the smartphone's WiFi range to send and execute code on th

As part of its " Vault 7 " series, Wikileaks — the popular whistle-blowing platform — has just released another batch of classified documents focused on exploits and hacking techniques the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) designed to target Apple MacOS and iOS devices. Dubbed " Dark Matter ," the leak uncovers macOS vulnerabilities and attack vectors developed by a special division of the CIA called Embedded Development Branch (EDB) – the same branch that created ' Weeping Angel ' attack – and focused specifically on hacking Mac and iOS firmware. CIA Infects Apple Devices With Unremovable Malware The newly released documents revealed that CIA had also been targeting the iPhone since 2008. The Agency has created a malware that is specially designed to infect Apple firmware in a way that the infection remains active on MacOS and iOS devices even if the operating system has been re-installed. According to Wikileaks, the released documents also gives a c

A newly discovered bug in Apple's iOS mobile operating system is being exploited in a prank that lets anyone crash your iPhone or iPad by just sending an emoji-filled iMessage, according to several reports. YouTube star EverythingApplePro published a video highlighting a sequence of characters that temporarily freeze and restart an iPhone, which people can send to their iPhone buddies to trouble them. You can watch the video demonstration below. Here's the first troublesome text: A white Flag emoji, the digit "0" and a Rainbow emoji. This simple numeric character, flag, and rainbow emojis confuse iOS 10 devices when it tries to combine them into a rainbow flag. As soon as this text is received, the iPhone's software attempts to combine the emojis but fails, and the messaging app crashes and eventually reboots in a few minutes. The recipients do not even have to open or read the message. Video Demonstration Another iPhone-crashing method involves

You might have also seen a viral video of the assassination of the Russian ambassador to Turkey that quickly spread through the Internet worldwide. Russian Ambassador Andrei Karlov was shot dead by an off-duty police officer in Ankara on December 19 when the ambassador was giving a speech at an art gallery. The shooter managed to pretend himself as his official bodyguard and later shot to death by Turkish special forces. After this shocking incident, Apple has been asked to help unlock an iPhone 4S recovered from the shooter, which could again spark up battle similar to the one between Apple and the FBI earlier this year. Turkish and Russian authorities have asked Apple to help them bypass the PIN code on an iPhone 4S, which, the authorities believe, could assist them to investigate killer's links to various terrorist organizations. Apple is expected to refuse the request, but according to MacReports and other local media, the Russian government is reportedly sending

In the fight against encryption , Apple has positioned itself as a staunch defender of its user privacy by refusing the federal officials to provide encryption backdoors into its products, as well as implementing better encryption for its products. However, a new report from a security firm suggests Apple's online syncing service iCloud secretly stores logs of its users' private information for as long as four months — even when iCloud backup is switched off. Russian digital forensics firm Elcomsoft discovered that Apple's mobile devices automatically send its users' call history to the company's servers if iCloud is enabled, and stored that data for up to four months. And it turns out that there is no way for iCloud users to stop this phone call syncing service unless they completely disable the cloud synchronization feature. Elcomsoft, which sells software to extract data from Apple's iCloud backups and works with police and intelligence agencies,

Hard time for mobile phone users! Just recently, two severe vulnerabilities in Qualcomm Snapdragon chip and Stagefright were spotted on the Android platform, affecting more than a Billion and Millions of devices respectively. And now: Hackers have discovered a new way to install malicious apps onto your iPhone without your interaction. Researchers at Palo Alto Networks have uncovered a new strain of malware that can infect Non-Jailbroken (factory-configured) iPhones and iPads without the owner's knowledge or interaction, leaving hundreds of millions of Apple iOS devices at risk. Dubbed AceDeceiver , the iPhone malware installs itself on iOS devices without enterprise certificates and exploits designing flaws in Apple's digital rights management (DRM) protection mechanism called FairPlay. What's more concerning about this malware: Unlike most iOS malware, AceDeceiver works on factory-configured (non-jailbroken) iOS devices as well. FairPlay

Before winding up the dispute of Apple and FBI over encryption, another buzz on the Whatsapp Snooping is now the hot debate on the court bench. In the wake of WhatsApp's move to offer end-to-end encryption to text messages as well as VoIP calls made through its app, federal authorities have not been able to execute wiretapping warrants on WhatsApp users. Though the US Department of Justice was discussing how to proceed with a continuing criminal investigation, the government is considering legal proceedings similar to those involved with Apple. According to the New York Times , as recently as this past week, a federal judge had approved a wiretap in a criminal investigation, but WhatsApp's encryption hindered investigators. Since any court officials have not made a final decision, the Department of Justice is very keen to drag Whatsapp into the Encryption fight war zone similar to the ongoing San Bernardino case . In San Bernardino case, the DoJ was gr

Are You an Employee? It's quite possible that someone has been reading your messages, emails, listening to your phone calls, and monitoring your activities at work. No, it's not a spy agency or any hacker… ...Oops! It's your Boss. Recently, European Court had ruled that the Employers can legally monitor as well as read workers' private messages sent via chat software like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger and webmail accounts like Gmail or Yahoo during working hours. So, if you own a company or are an Employer, then you no need to worry about tracking your employees because you have right to take care of things that could highly affect your company and its reputation, and that is Your Employees! Since there are several reasons such as Financial Need, Revenge, Divided Loyalty or Ego, why a loyal employee might turn into an INSIDER THREAT . Insider Threat is a nightmare for Millions of Employers. Your employees could collect and leak all your professional,

The United States is not the only one where Apple is battling with the federal authorities over iPhone encryption. Apple could face $1 Million in Fine each time the company refused to unlock an iPhone in France. Despite its victory in a New York court yesterday, Apple may not be so successful elsewhere in fighting against federal authorities over iPhone encryption battle. Yann Galut, a member of France's Socialist Party, has submitted an amendment to a bill aimed at strengthening the French government's ability to fight against terrorism — by arguing that… Apple should pay a Million Euro ( $1.08 Million ) fine for every iPhone Apple refuses to unlock when asked to by law enforcement, The Local reported . The same €1 Million penalty could apply to Google as well under similar conditions, forcing the tech companies to help its investigators extract data from a suspect's smartphone in terrorism cases. The French police seized eight smartphones last year in terror investiga

Yes, FBI Director James Comey admitted that the investigators made a " mistake " with the San Bernardino investigation during a congressional hearing held by the House Judiciary Committee. Apple is facing a court order to help the FBI unlock an iPhone belonged to San Bernardino Shooter by developing a backdoored version of iOS that can disable the security feature on the locked iPhone. Apple's Chief Executive Tim Cook has maintained his stand over Privacy and Security , saying the company will fight the court order because it is dangerous for the security and privacy of all of its users. As the company earlier said, Apple had been helping the FBI with the investigation in San Bernardino case since early January by providing an iCloud backup of Farook's iPhone under a court order and ways to access Farook's iPhone… ...but the problem, according to Apple, was that the feds approached the company after attempting a ' blunder ' themselv

Apple - 1; The FBI - 0 Apple Won a major court victory against the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in an ongoing legal battle similar to San Bernardino. In a New York case, a federal magistrate judge has ruled in favor of Apple, rejecting the U.S. government's request to force Apple to help the FBI extract data from a locked iPhone. This ruling from United States Magistrate Judge James Orenstein for the Eastern District of New York is a significant boost to Apple's pro-privacy stance to resist the agency's similar efforts over unlocking iPhone 5C of an alleged San Bernardino terrorist. The ruling [ PDF ] was issued on Monday as part of the criminal case against Jun Feng , who was pleaded guilty in October last year to drug charges. The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) seized Feng's iPhone 5 last year, but even after consulting the FBI, it was unable to access the iPhone. According to both the DEA and FBI, it's impossible for them to ov

Amid an ongoing dispute with the United States government over a court order to unlock iPhone 5C of one of the San Bernardino shooters Syed Farook… ...Apple started working on implementing stronger security measures "even it can't hack" to achieve un-hackability in its future iPhones. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is deliberately forcing Apple to create a special, backdoored version of iOS that could let them brute force the passcode on Farook's iPhone without erasing data. However, the FBI approached the company to unlock the shooter's iPhone 5C in various ways like: Create a backdoor to shooter's iPhone. Disable the Auto-destruct feature after numerous tries. Increase the brute force time to try out all combinations. Minimize the time of waiting for a window after each try. ..and much more Apple is still fighting the battle even after the clear refusal to the court that it will not provide any backdoor access to the a

Apple to make future iPhones compatible with a cutting-edge technology that has the capability to transmit data at 100 times the speed of WiFi , suggests the code found within the iOS firmware. Apple may ship future iPhones with Li-Fi capabilities, a new technology that may end up replacing the widely-used Wi-Fi in the future technology. Beginning with iOS 9.1 update, the operating system's source code makes mention of " LiFiCapability " alongside declarations to other hardware and software capabilities, hinting that Apple may be experimenting with ways to integrate Li-Fi technology with future iPhones models. Li-Fi compatibility with Future iPhones Li-Fi compatibility was spotted in the code for iOS 9.1 by a Twitter user, who goes by name Chase Fromm, and was independently confirmed by Apple Insider. However, there is no such indication that Apple is actually working with Li-Fi. But, as pointed out by Apple Insider, Apple filed a patent applic