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Apple Says Sorry For iPhone Error 53 and Issues IOS 9.2.1 Update To Fix It (betanews.com)
Mark Wilson writes: Apple has a lot of support at the moment for its stance on encryption and refusing the FBI access to an iPhone's contents, but it's only a couple of weeks since the company was seen in a less favorable light. There was quite a backlash when users found that installing an update to iOS resulted in Error 53 and a bricked iPhone. Apple initially said that Error 53 was caused 'for security reasons' following speculation that it was a bid to stop people from using third party repair shops. iFixit suggested that the problem was a result of a failure of parts to correctly sync, and Apple has been rounding criticized for failing to come up with a fix. Today the company has issued an apology, along with an update that ensures Error 53 won't happen again. But there's more good news ... If you were talked into paying for an out of warranty replacement as a result of Error 53, you could be in line to get your money back.
Stealthily pushing out an update that will make cracking the Secure Enclave easier in future FBI investigations?
OK... Before I get savaged.... They ARE refunding anybody who has paid Apple to repair their phone.... No mention of those who just purchased a new phone though...
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i thought the point of this error 53 was to purposely render your data inaccessible in the case where the touchID had been tampered with? when i read about it, i was like, the people that are whining about this don't fully understand security, that this bricking thing is actually good, cuz a bad guy could replace a real touch sensor with a compromised one, then unlock the phone with a fake fingerprint. now, with this "fix", it seems a bad guy could do exactly that? i'm sure i'm missing something.
The Touch ID sensor died on my wife's iPhone 6S, and it prevented the iOS 9.2.1 update from installing even after doing a factory reset.
The Apple Store couldn't fix the issue, so she got a brand new phone out of the deal. Good thing the phone was still under warranty!
"This update will restore phones âbrickedâ(TM) or disabled by Error 53 and will prevent future iPhones that have had their home button (or the cable) replaced by third-party repair centers from being disabled." From the article on techcrunch.
Minimum threshold fixed. Thanks!
All right, I'm partially wrong. iOS 9.2.1 is from Jan 2016, but Apple pushed a new build of 9.2.1 on 18 Feb 2016 to fix the Error 53 issue. The /. headline says 9.2.1 came out today, which is why I was confused.
Also, to get the new build of 9.2.1, you apparently need to download it through iTunes, not over your iDevice's Wi-Fi connection.
Keep your eyes to the sky.
If you are running iOS 9.2 and swap out the fingerprint sensor you will immediately get Error 53 and it will wedge your phone.
The intention here was security, Apple clearly didn't anticipate or test against phones that got unauthorized sensor replacements and thus the unintentional bricking. The new update just renders the replaced sensor inoperative but otherwise allows the phone to be used normally.
The real sensor takes some effort to ensure you are pressing something like a finger to the sensor (a picture of a fingerprint won't work). A fake 'sensor' could just pass images from a database.
It's not undefeatable, but security has nothing to do with perfection, it has to do with making something harder and more expensive.
As of iOS 9.2.1 Apple disables a tainted fingerprint sensor and reverts to passcode security. We eagerly await your retraction.
Apple does this quite frequently when they make a minor mistake in an update, silently releasing a new build with the same version number. What this signifies is that for 99.9999% of users, there's no functional difference between the two builds, so they didn't feel the need to turn a new build number and force everyone to update over something that affects probably a single-digit number of users.
By turning the build, they're ensuring that no new users encounter the problem going forwards, and providing a mechanism for the few affected users to get their devices up and running again (by manually reinstalling the current update). It wouldn't be an automated update anyway, because the devices won't let you use them, so for affected users, bumping the version number gains them nothing. And bumping the version number for everyone else would have resulted in everybody downloading a patch that they really don't need, and worse, would have caused anybody upgrading from 9.2 to (for example) 9.2.1a to get hit with a much larger combo update because they skipped the quirky 9.2.1 build.
When the next OS release happens, everybody will be back in sync, and until then, the differences are minor enough that they really don't matter for the most part.
With that said, if you want to know which version you are running, go to Settings > General > About, and look at the Version field. If it says 9.2.1 (13D15), you're running the older build. If it says 9.2.1 (13D20), you're running the newer build.
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No more so than they could without changing the scanner. This change doesn't enable fake fingerprint scanners. It just lets you continue to use the device with a passcode as though the fingerprint scanner weren't there.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.