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The allegations from a data forensic expert and security researcher that iOS contains a " backdoor " permitting third parties to potentially gain access to large amount of users' personal data instigated Apple to give a strong response. The company has completely denied to the claims published over the weekend by Jonathan Zdziarski, a forensic scientist and iOS security expert. The researcher, better identified as the hacker moniker " NerveGas ", detailed a number of undocumented features in a paper presentation titled, " Identifying Backdoors, Attack Points, and Surveillance Mechanisms in iOS Devices " showing his findings, from his talk at the Hackers On Planet Earth (HOPE X) conference held in New York on Friday. ALLEGATIONS ON APPLE The issue, what he explained in his finding, arises from the way Apple encrypts or fails to encrypt data from the iPhone's native apps, leaving over 600 million personal iOS devices vulnerable to third parties. &q

A well known iPhone hacker and forensic scientist has unearthed a range of undocumented and hidden functions in Apple iOS mobile operating system that make it possible for a hacker to completely bypass the backup encryption on iOS devices and can steal large amounts of users' personal data without entering passwords or personal identification numbers. Data forensics expert named Jonathan Zdziarski has posted the slides ( PDF ) titled " Identifying Backdoors, Attack Points, and Surveillance Mechanisms in iOS Devices " showing his findings, from his talk at the Hackers On Planet Earth (HOPE X) conference held in New York on Friday. Jonathan Zdziarski, better identified as the hacker " NerveGas " in the iPhone development community, worked as dev-team member on many of the early iOS jailbreaks and is also the author of five iOS-related O'Reilly books including " Hacking and Securing iOS Applications ." The results of his overall research on the iOS

Identities now transcend human boundaries. Within each line of code and every API call lies a non-human identity. These entities act as programmatic access keys, enabling authentication and facilitating interactions among systems and services, which are essential for every API call, database query, or storage account access. As we depend on multi-factor authentication and passwords to safeguard human identities, a pressing question arises: How do we guarantee the security and integrity of these non-human counterparts? How do we authenticate, authorize, and regulate access for entities devoid of life but crucial for the functioning of critical systems? Let's break it down. The challenge Imagine a cloud-native application as a bustling metropolis of tiny neighborhoods known as microservices, all neatly packed into containers. These microservices function akin to diligent worker bees, each diligently performing its designated task, be it processing data, verifying credentials, or

BigBoss repository, one of the biggest and most popular repositories for jailbreak tweaks in Cydia , has reportedly been hacked by either an individual or a group of hackers. Cydia is a software application for iOS that enables a user to find and install software packages on jailbroken iOS Apple devices such as the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and the iPad. Most of the software packages available through Cydia are free, but some require purchasing. The BigBoss repository is default repository in jailbroken iOS devices and has long been one of Cydia's biggest and best, but it may have just been targeted by cybercriminals. The hackers, who go by the name "Kim Jong-Cracks", managed to gain access to all packages , including all paid as well as free, and made their own repository available with all BigBoss repository applications for free. " The other post more than likely broke rule 1 because it linked the site directly. To anyone that didn't see the post the BigBoss rep

Google has failed to provide a very important security measure in its Gmail application for iOS that left millions of its Apple device users to Man-in-the-Middle (MitM) attacks capable of monitoring encrypted email communications. Researcher at mobile security firm Lacoon has discovered that Google's Gmail iOS application, run on Macintosh mobile devices, does not perform what's known as "certificate pinning" when establishing a trusted connection between the mobile applications and back-end web services, which means an attacker can view plaintext emails and steal credentials in MitM attack. WHAT IS CERTIFICATE PINNING Certificate Pinning is a process designed to prevent user of the application from being a victim of an attack made by spoofing the SSL certificate . Certificate pinning automatically rejects the whole connection from sites that offer bogus SSL certificates and allow only SSL connections to hosts signed with certificates stored inside the application, whic

Security researchers from MetaIntell, the leader in intelligent led Mobile Risk Management (MRM), have discovered a major security vulnerability in the latest version of Facebook SDK that put millions of Facebook user's Authentication Tokens at risk. Facebook SDK for Android and iOS is the easiest way to integrate mobile apps with Facebook platform, which provides support for Login with Facebook authentication, reading and writing to Facebook APIs and many more. Facebook OAuth authentication or ' Login as Facebook ' mechanism is a personalized and secure way for users to sign into 3rd party apps without sharing their passwords. After the user approves the permissions as requested by the application, the Facebook SDK implements the OAuth 2.0 User-Agent flow to retrieve the secret user's access token required by the apps to call Facebook APIs to read, modify or write user's Facebook data on their behalf. ACCESSING UNENCRYPTED ACCESS TOKEN It is important that

Quite Surprisingly, a team of Chinese hackers, Pangu have released an untethered jailbreak for iOS 7.1 and iOS 7.1.1. This untethered jailbreak is compatible with iPhone 5s, iPhone 5c, iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, iPad Air, iPad 4, iPad 3, iPad 2, iPad mini, Retina iPad mini and iPod touch 5G running iOS 7.1-iOS 7.1.1. The jailbreak tool is currently available for Windows but works on every iOS devices. Many iOS users have posted on Reddit that the tool works successfully. Jailbreaking is a process of removing limitations on iOS devices , Apple's operating system, so you can install third party software not certified by Apple. Such devices include the iPhone, iPod touch, iPad, and second-generation Apple TV. One question rises in my mind that when Apple 's system root protections have been greatly enhanced in an effort to make jailbreaks more difficult, then what's the whole story behind the unexpectedly release of this jailbreak tool? STEPS TO JAILBREAK iOS 7.1 &a

The development of self own languages has become emblematic of the hot new trend in business as every big Internet service provider is now developing their own and unique programming languages. Two months ago, Facebook released its modern programming language called ' HACK ', which is specially designed to make the process of writing and testing code of complex websites and other software faster, and the company already drives almost all of the its social networking site to HACK over the last year. This Monday, Apple surprises the gathering of people who build software applications for Apple hardware devices at its World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) by introducing its whole new programming language called Swift , which probably replace Apple's main programming language - Objective-C that is being loved by the developers who build software applications for Apple hardware devices, from iPhone, iPad to Macintosh. The first app built on Swift is the WWDC ap

Apple has just released a pair of software updates for its Safari web browser addressing multiple Webkit vulnerabilities in Mac OS X, providing its users with 21 security patches. The critical bug resides in the Safari 7.0.4 for Mac OS X Mavericks 10.9.3 and Safari 6.1.4 for OS X Lion 10.7.5, OS X Lion Server 10.7.5 and Mountain Lion 10.8.5. According to Apple's security advisory , All of the 21 security flaws address the iOS browser vulnerabilities proliferating through the Safari's open-source Webkit rendering engine. This webkit vulnerability allows a malicious website to execute an arbitrary code on the host computer or unexpected termination of an application in an effort to compromise users' confidential information. " Visiting a maliciously crafted website may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution ," Apple warned in the advisory. Security updates tackle a number of flaws including: CVE-2013-2875 CVE-2013-2927 CV

Despite the contrary regarding NSA's DROPOUTJEEP program, Apple had always denied working with the NSA in the creation of any backdoors used to spy on its users and also claimed that the NSA doesn't have backdoor access to its data. But, Apple could legally share your phone data with the law enforcement agencies if asked for. Being a secretive company, Apple is very clear at its point of sharing its users' data with the government when U.S. law enforcement agencies request data relating to the company's users. With the release of a set of new guidelines late Wednesday regarding requests for customer data from the U.S. law enforcement agencies, Apple specifies what information can and cannot be lifted from its users devices upon the receipt of disclosure requests, search warrants, or legal orders. " These guidelines are provided for use by law enforcement or other government entities in the U.S. when seeking information from Apple Inc. about users of Apple

A new piece of malicious malware infection targeting jailbroken Apple iOS devices in an attempt to steal users' credentials, has been discovered by Reddit users. The Reddit Jailbreak community discovered the malicious infection dubbed as ' Unflod Baby Panda ', on some jailbroken Apple iOS devices on Thursday while a user noticed an unusual activity that the file was causing apps such as Snapchat and Google Hangouts to crash constantly on his jailbroken iPhone. CHINA WANTS YOUR APPLE ID & PASSWORDS Soon after the jailbroken developer uncovered the mysteries ' Unfold.dylib ' file and found that the infection targets jailbroken iOS handsets to captures Apple IDs and passwords from Internet sessions that use Secure Socket Layer (SSL) to encrypt communications and is believed to be spreading through the Chinese iOS software sites, according to the researchers at German security firm SektionEins . The researchers found that the captured login information is been sent

Is Air Travel expensive for You?? Of course it's costly for Common people. But, hackers have found a way out of it too. If you have an iPhone then there is no need to buy airline tickets, as a simple iPhone hack can fool any modern airport and get you a seat in first class for free. Anthony Hariton , an 18 year-old computer science student at the University of Crete in Greece, claims he has found a plough to fetch free flight tickets across Europe by generating fake boarding passes designed for Apple's Passbook app. The student prepares to give his presentation entitled " Exploiting Passbook to Fly for Free, " in a hacking conference next month, in which he will theoretically demonstrate on how to generate fake boarding passes using only a computer and an iPhone, then get through all the Security Airport checks and then eventually ending up on your first class seat to the destination of your choice. HACKING iPHONE APP TO GET FREE BOARDING PASSES The iO

Cryptocat , an open source encrypted web-based chat client, is now available for iOS Devices from the  Apple's App store , which was initially rejected by the Apple last December. It is not clear why it was rejected previously, but the good news is that, now ' Cryptocat ' is available for all iOS Devices. So far Cryptocat was only available for Linux and Mac OS X, and as an extension for web browsers Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome 3, Apple Safari and Opera . Cryptocat has become quite popular in the wake of the NSA Controversy, because of its end-to-end encryption that doesn't allow anyone in the middle to read your messages. Cryptocat for iPhone uses the OTR protocol for private conversations, a cryptographic protocol for secure instant messaging, and perfect forward secrecy, a system that constantly generates new user keys. So, snoops cannot decrypt older messages. It doesn't require any username or account rather just one time nickname makes the

Just two days before Apple has disclosed a critical Security flaw in the SSL implementation on the iOS software that would allow man-in-the-middle attacks to intercept the SSL data by spoofing SSL servers. Dubbed as CVE-2014-1266 , the so-called ' goto  fail; ' vulnerability in which the secure transport failed to validate the authenticity of the connection has left millions of Apple users vulnerable to Hackers and Spy Agencies, especially like the NSA . Last Friday, Apple had also released updated version iOS 7.0.6 to patch the vulnerability, which was first discovered in Apple's iOS Devices, but later company had acknowledged its presence in Mac OSX also, that could allow hackers to intercept email and other communications that are meant to be encrypted in iPhone, iPad and Mac computer. Affected versions include iOS up to version 7.0.5 and OS X before 10.9.2. Security Researchers confirmed , ' Nearly all encrypted traffic, including usernames, passwords, and

Apple's latest 35.4 MB update of  iOS 7.0.6  doesn't seem important at first, but it contains a critical security patch that addresses a flaw with SSL encryption. Yes, a very critical security vulnerability that could allow hackers to intercept email and other communications that are meant to be encrypted in iPhone, iPad and Mac computer. Apple provides very little information when disclosing security issues, ' For the protection of our customers, Apple does not disclose, discuss, or confirm security issues until a full investigation has occurred and any necessary patches or releases are available. ' said in the security advisory . Cryptography experts immediately tried to figure out what was wrong with Apple's implementation of Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and the details are: Impact:  The vulnerability assigned CVE-2014-1266 and  affects both the iOS and OS X operating systems , describes as ' Secure Transport failed to validate the authent

Last October, the social network ' LinkedIn ' launched a controversial Smartphone app called ' Intro ' that intercepts and route all of your emails through LinkedIn servers to inject LinkedIn profiles of the sender directly into the mails. The app was released for Android , as well as iOS devices. Why Controversial? The app puts the security and privacy of your data entirely in the company's hands, and at that time everyone criticized and reacted negatively, but LinkedIn defended Intro, claiming that all information was fully encrypted and deleted from LinkedIn's servers immediately. Just two days back, I got an e-mail from LinkedIn with the subject line " We're retiring LinkedIn Intro. " i.e. LinkedIn is giving up so quickly just four months of the launch! In a blog post today, LinkedIn SVP of products Deep Mishar explained, " We are shutting down LinkedIn Intro as of March 7, 2014. The intro was launched last year to bring the power of LinkedIn to your emai

Smartphone manufacturers are adding ways for owners to track and manage their phones if they ever get lost or stolen. Find My iPhone is a service that comes with every iOS device that allows you to track your iPhone, whether it was lost or stolen. Normally, the iPhone requires a password if you want to deactivate " Find My iPhone ", but it isn't entirely perfect and thieves are now smart enough to disable ' Find My iPhone ' on devices running iOS 7.0.4 and lower version, without having to enter a password. The exploit was discovered and demonstrated security researcher ' Bradley Williams ' and performing a successful bypass means you won't be able to locate, make sound and wipe out. The vulnerability could put the devices at risk, and the exploitation method involves a few simple steps that involve making changes in the iCloud settings, even if they don't know the password. Steps to hack 'Find My iPhone': Navigate to iCloud in the settin