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Researcher Finds Hidden Data-Dumping Services In iOS
Trailrunner7 writes There are a number of undocumented and hidden features and services in Apple iOS that can be used to bypass the backup encryption on iOS devices and remove large amounts of users' personal data. Several of these features began as benign services but have evolved in recent years to become powerful tools for acquiring user data.
Jonathan Zdziarski, a forensic scientist and researcher who has worked extensively with law enforcement and intelligence agencies, has spent quite a bit of time looking at the capabilities and services available in iOS for data acquisition and found that some of the services have no real reason to be on these devices and that several have the ability to bypass the iOS backup encryption. One of the services in iOS, called mobile file_relay, can be accessed remotely or through a USB connection can be used to bypass the backup encryption. If the device has not been rebooted since the last time the user entered the PIN, all of the data encrypted via data protection can be accessed, whether by an attacker or law enforcement, Zdziarski said. Update: 07/21 22:15 GMT by U L : Slides.
Jonathan Zdziarski, a forensic scientist and researcher who has worked extensively with law enforcement and intelligence agencies, has spent quite a bit of time looking at the capabilities and services available in iOS for data acquisition and found that some of the services have no real reason to be on these devices and that several have the ability to bypass the iOS backup encryption. One of the services in iOS, called mobile file_relay, can be accessed remotely or through a USB connection can be used to bypass the backup encryption. If the device has not been rebooted since the last time the user entered the PIN, all of the data encrypted via data protection can be accessed, whether by an attacker or law enforcement, Zdziarski said. Update: 07/21 22:15 GMT by U L : Slides.
People want to read something like "The iPhone has a secret backdoor for the NSA!!!". Anything much longer than that will never be read or understood by most people.
It's hopeless. Ask 100 people who have heard of this and 95 of them will tell you that it is proven now that the iPhone has a secret backdoor for the NSA over which all data can just be read by them.
(And I'm not even saying that it has NO such backdoor. Maybe it has. But this isn't it. This just isn't designed for mass surveillance, it needs a cooperating user and individual access to a device the user has connected his iPhone to. Maybe it's a side door for law enforcement and/or forensics additionally to a debugging tool.)
And how much crap is installed on Android you can't disable (or know is there) without rooting your phone?
How much crap on Windows phone? I bet you can neither disable nor know it's there.
Your BlackBerry?
So, please, tell us, how are Android, Windows or BlackBerry phones any better? Can you prove none of them has something similar?
I very much doubt you can.
You can choose to not have a device at all, but I have my doubts you can choose a phone which doesn't have similar security holes you know nothing about.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.