Slashdot Mirror
Apple's iPhone Already Has a Backdoor
Nicola Hahn writes: As the Department of Justice exerts legal pressure on Apple in an effort to recover data from the iPhone used by Syed Rizwan Farook, Apple's CEO has publicly stated that "the U.S. government has asked us for something we simply do not have, and something we consider too dangerous to create. They have asked us to build a backdoor to the iPhone." But, as one Windows rootkit developer has observed, the existing functionality that the FBI seeks to leverage is itself a backdoor. Specifically, the ability to remotely update code on a device automatically, without user intervention, represents a fairly serious threat vector. Update features marketed as a safety mechanism can just as easily be wielded to subvert technology if the update source isn't trustworthy. Something to consider in light of the government's ability to steal digital certificates and manipulate network traffic, not to mention the private sector's lengthy history of secret cooperation.
Related: wiredmikey writes: Apple said Monday it would accept having a panel of experts consider access to encrypted devices if US authorities drop efforts to force it to help break into the iPhone of a California attacker. Apple reaffirmed its opposition to the US government's effort to compel it to provide technical assistance to the FBI investigation of the San Bernardino attacks, but also suggested a compromise in the highly charged legal battle.
In his first public remarks since Apple CEO Tim Cook said he would fight the federal magistrate's order, FBI Director James Comey claimed the Justice Department's request is is about "the victims and justice."
In his first public remarks since Apple CEO Tim Cook said he would fight the federal magistrate's order, FBI Director James Comey claimed the Justice Department's request is is about "the victims and justice."
In the context of this article it is worth pointing out the letter that Tim Cook sent out to Apple employees:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-po...
I believe he makes good points, and where ever we end up, it should be because of proper discussion understanding implications, rather than because 'Apple is evil' mantra, that will end up burning everyone.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
I hate Apple as much as the next anti-Apple-fan boy, but come on. Literally EVERY OS has this concern. I wouldn't call it a backdoor anymore than I would suggest that having a window not made out of bulletproof glass is an open invitation for robbers into your house. In other words, this is sort of like "duhhhhhhh" material and hardly newsworthy. Now having an open and honest discussion about the security of update services for OS and the security methodologies employed, would be a fantastic article.
When I read exactly what the FBI was asking Apple to do, I realized that there was a back door, and that Apple will most likely be doing what they can to close this back door in a future iPhone release.
If I were Apple, I'd make sure a future release gave the user the option of only allowing firmware updates after the user logged in. This doesn't have to be required for every iPhone (corporations might want this disabled on iPhones they purchase for their employees), but it should at least be an option.
Signed updates are fine, as long as you can't update the firmware in your secure memory to alter the maximum number of wrong guesses before erasing or reduce the minimum time between guesses. That way even if the OS image is compromised you still need to enter the correct code within n attempts to unlock the device.
It seems incredible that Apple thought it would be a good idea to build that functionality. I don't know of any other ARM CPU design that allows it, for this exact reason.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Listen up, law enforcement, DoJ, et al. I am more afraid of your incompetence than I am any dark "world domination" motive on your part, but I am nowhere near as afraid of :"teh terrorists" as I am of you, regardless of your motive. So hands off my crypto. M'kay?
Nicola Hahn is incorrect. No one has stated that Apple has the ability to, "remotely update code on a device automatically, without user intervention". The method the device would be updated requires DFU (Device Firmware Upgrade) mode, physical possession of the device and a USB connection to a PC/Mac: https://www.theiphonewiki.com/... Way to grab a headline, though...
What they're talking about is putting the phone into Device Firmware Update mode, like this. Only then will they be able to update it remotely and on the newest iPhones that'd also wipe the encryption keys. But not on the model in question here.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
This is all a giant Cluster Fuck.
It's still unclear; does the FBI want to give the phone to Apple so they can break in, or do they want apple to give them the tools to do it themselves?
If it's the former, then Apple should get it done, then destroy the tools and cal it a day. if it's the latter, then Apple should make it clear and call them out on it.
What is clear is that getting the data from the phone is not secondary to the Us vs Them bullshit going on now.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Lot's of good discussion about iOS and Apple.
I would like to have the same analysis about the state of Andriod. Can it be made secure against such backdoors? Do third-party flavors and rooting have a role? Is it possible to have a device where all software and firmware code can be examined?
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
Apple has updated the secure enclave with an iOS update in the past and added additional protection, so it presumably can do an update that would REMOVE protections on the SE. So the same scenario of this phone can theoretically be applied to any existing iPhone and not just a 5c.
So right now, Apple is making the iPhone 7 immune to this attack vector. With the iPhone7, even Apple with not be able to do a firmware modification to the SE in DFU mode. The correct user password will *have* to be entered in the iPhone7 and it will be enforced solely in the SE hardware. There will be nothing that can get around that. You can't solder on a different SE chip, you can't swap components, change the IEMI, or anything else.
That will be the selling point of the iPhone 7. iOS 9 was software-based protection since a software update could (apparently) change the SE. Apple will disclaim they never expected their own government trying to force them to create a hacker-version of iOS, so security of the iPhone has to be hardware based. iPhone7 will have true 100% bulletproof hardware-based protection that will truly be bulletproof. And that is what they will sell.
Then, unfortunately, the FBI will simply demand iOS source code and signing keys.
The cell provider gave them their info and Apple gave the FBI the last iCloud back-up for the device, so what more could they actually find on the phone that would be of such a great use? I mean, I have a hard time believing that a couple of people that think throwing a hard drive in to a lake destroys the data on it would have the info on their phone not back-up to iCloud or have used something that is only obtainable from the unlocked phone itself. Add to that the story of the phones pass code changing while in FBI possession, which would be easy to track, and that the reports were that they threw their phones in the lake too. So you can find a 18 year old downloading illegal movies, but you can't track who changed the phone's lock code?? Ahhh yeahhhh, all of it together seems like some overwhelming bullshit.
iPhone has a backdoor for apple's own use. For a lot of people, it's OK as long as only Apple uses it. Even if they know about it, they understand it as a fair trade. Well, for me it is not OK but I am a minority so I work around the problem by not using i-devices.
FBI wants to use this very backdoor, too. For a lot of people, this is already NOT OK. The government is pretty much different from a company you have business with.
And it is not about the ability to crack. NSA probably has the resources to do that. FBI wants it "by the law".
After ten failed tries an iPhone can, if turned on, which by default is not, erase all data on the phone. Have a hard time believing that terrorist that throw a hard drive in to a lake thinking it will destroy it would know this about the iPhone AND have it turned on. FBI is just using this as an excuse to get it's claws in something the easy way, and set president in forcing a private company to do it's bidding.
It's obvious that the FBI doesn't have a good intellectual or legal argument, and they're now resorting to an emotional one.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
This is all distraction, as operating system configuration and patching is not a "backdoor'.
The best response to the FBI's request I've read thus far comes from the noted IOS forensics security guru, Jonathan Zdziarski where he wrote the following
An instrument is the term used in the courts to describe anything from a breathalyzer device to a forensics tool, and in order to get judicial notice of a new instrument, it must be established that it is validated, peer reviewed, and accepted in the scientific community. It is also held to strict requirements of reproducibility and predictability, requiring third parties (such as defense experts) to have access to it. I've often heard Cellebrite referred to, for example, as the Cellebrite instrument in courts. Instruments are treated very differently from a simple lab service, like dumping a phone. I've done both of these for law enforcement in the past: provided services, and developed a forensics tool. Providing a simple dump of a disk image only involves my giving testimony of my technique. My forensics tools, however, required a much thorough process that took significant resources, and they would for Apple too.
The tool must be designed and developed under much more stringent practices that involve reproducible, predictable results, extensive error checking, documentation, adequate logging of errors, and so on. The tool must be forensically sound and not change anything on the target, or document every change that it makes / is made in the process. Full documentation must be written that explains the methods and techniques used to disable Apple's own security features. The tool cannot simply be some throw-together to break a PIN; it must be designed in a manner in which its function can be explained, and its methodology could be reproduced by independent third parties. Since FBI is supposedly the ones to provide the PIN codes to try, Apple must also design and develop an interface / harness to communicate PINs into the tool, which means added engineering for input validation, protocol design, more logging, error handling, and so on. FBI has asked to do this wirelessly (possibly remotely), which also means transit encryption, validation, certificate revocation, and so on.
Once the tool itself is designed, it must be tested internally on a number of devices with exactly matching versions of hardware and operating system, and peer reviewed internally to establish a pool of peer-review experts that can vouch for the technology. In my case, it was a bunch of scientists from various government agencies doing the peer-review for me. The test devices will be imaged before and after, and their disk images compared to ensure that no bits were changed; changes that do occur from the operating system unlocking, logging, etc., will need to be documented so they can be explained to the courts. Bugs must be addressed. The user interface must be simplified and robust in its error handling so that it can be used by third parties.
Once the tool is ready, it must be tested and validated by a third party. In this case, it would be NIST/NIJ (which is where my own tools were validated). NIST has a mobile forensics testing and validation process by which Apple would need to provide a copy of the tool (which would have to work on all of their test devices) for NIST to verify. NIST checks to ensure that all of the data on the test devices is recovered. Any time the software is updated, it should go back through the validation process. Once NIST tests and validates the device, it would be clear for the FBI to use on the device. Here is an example of what my tools validation from NIJ looks like: https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles...
During trial, the court will want to see what kind of scientific peer review the tool has had; if it is not validated by NIST or some other third party, or has no acceptance in the scientific community,
Something which I had been questioning from the day I heard the phone was not the terrorist's but owned by a country government in California, couldn't something such as AirWatch be used to unlock the phone?
My answer came over the weekend when I read this article which stated the county paid for but never installed such software.
Having been responsible for setting up iPhones for a state agency, one of the steps was installing AirWatch which we did have to use on a few occasions when people locked themselves out.
Not installing such software is either incompetence or laziness on the part of the IT folks who handed out these phones.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
You must have missed all of those FACTS stating otherwise. Apple has confirmed that they CAN do what the DOJ is asking, but they don't WANT to because they feel, and I would agree, that it sets an extremely dangerous precedent. I haven't seen any definitive information indicating whether the update can be done OTA or must be done via a USB cable and booting into a low level mode. Either way, the fact that a device can have it's software and/or firmware updated without user intervention is a security hole, but seeing as the software and/or firmware must be signed by Apple, I'm not sure I would classify this as a 'backdoor' unless, of course, those signing keys are in the wild. I would add citations but I'm on my Android phone and feeling to lazy to do so.
While some of this is true, I think the real answer is even simpler: they're disposable.
There's a reason that the phones are called burner phones; if it gets trashed or destroyed for whatever reason, you're not out anything except an easily replicated list of phone numbers.
Likewise, a lot of burner phones just don't have many of the tattle-tale features that smart phones do; older models lack GPS, very little on-board memory for logging, and so on.
While law enforcement certainly does have the means to spy on these phones, the ability to rapidly dispose of and cheaply replace them is why they are still useful.
I hope you're right, but SCOTUS says money is speech and people are still compelled to pay money.
The issue of compelled speech is not completely settled either. The courts have ruled both that it can be and that it can't be depending on circumstances.
http://www.firstamendmentcente...
https://www.washingtonpost.com...
https://www.researchgate.net/p...
Atari Phone is clearly best phone.
It has genuine woodgrain vinyl overlay.
running vi, naturally
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
I'm seriously wondering if this whole thing could really just be a giant PR/marketing exercise by Apple, when in fact they are already complying with the NSA?
http://www.theguardian.com/wor...
To me that is the very definition of a back door, apple can install arbitrary software on your phone without your consent. That is make your phone do whatever apple wants without consent.
The biggest reason why Apple would not help, other than the possibility that there is no help they are capable of offering (which is conceivable), is that by doing so, they would be confirming beyond any shadow of doubt that it is even actually possible.
The realization that something is physically possible is a *HUGE* incentive for some people to try and figure out how it is done, and if Apple can do it, then so can other people... people with much more nefarious intentions than even an untrustworthy government.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
To me that is the very definition of a back door, apple can install arbitrary software on your phone without your consent.
Um, what hardware do you have upon which it is impossible for someone with physical control of the hardware cannot install software? -and if your answer is, "but at least I can encrypt my data"-- you do know that the proposed software that the FBI demands that Apple write doesn't actually get them into the phone; it just gives them the opportunity to brute-force the password.
If the SE is designed correctly then even publishing the source code and signing keys will not allow recovering the encryption key.
That's what the S stands for!
-- I was raised on the command line, bitch
Isn't there always the option of reverse engineering at the hardware level? Authorities could always pop open the flash and then use an electron microscope to read the current state of memory. They could then either reverse engineer the whole thing, or, perhaps less expensively, clone it into another phone and cycle through the pass codes to find the right one. If the phone bricks, reinitialize and keep going, or use another cloned phone. Expensive, but at least this ensures that they'll only do this for phones they're **really** interested in cracking. I'm sure the CIA and NSA would have to do this with some of the (foreign) equipment they come across, so they must be pretty good at it by now.