Security flaw provides access to locked iPhones.
Whenever I hear about someone discovering an obscure security flaw in a new electronic device, my first thought is always, “Do these people have anything else going on in their lives?” The amount of time that some people spend on trying to find security breaches is incredible, especially when they’re doing it out of boredom or because they want their 15 minutes of fame on YouTube. But sometimes my second thought is, “Uh oh!”
The latest example that I’ve heard about is a new video on YouTube that demonstrates that passwords on iPhones can be hacked, giving the hacker the ability to make calls, listen to messages and mess with contact lists. A tech blogger added that he was also able to access photos using the trick.
The way it works is by using one phone to call the targeted phone, then cancelling the call and answering with the targeted phone while fiddling with the power button. Sounds rather bizarre, but apparently it works because Apple announced that it would deliver a fix for the problem in a future software update.
You can read CNN coverage of this here.
The person who posted the video asked people to “do no evil” with this trick, but to use it to have fun with it with friends. But now it’s out there and I’m guessing somebody is going to try to take advantage of somebody else.
Have you ever been the victim of a security flaw in your phone or some other electronic device? Please chime in with details about your experiences.
And this is why I NEVER use an iPhone!!!!! There are just too many issues and you can’t remove or expand the memory of the phone. With Android you can root the phone and expand the memory and it’s removable on most phones, plus you can now install your own 64 Gig micro SD memory card, or 32 Gig, or what ever you like, Oh you can also replace the battery on most Android phone too!!! Can’t do any of this with an iPhone!!!…….. I know apples and oranges !!!!!!
Remember folks, a “smart phone” is really a small computer. Know your stuff, get an Android, or Windows or better yet a Linux “smart phone”. Root the OS on the phone, install software that protects your device just like you do for your PC, and be careful, be alert. We have to take responsibility for our own devices, need to stay on top of changes, upgrades and so on. Good luck, be alert, be safe.
Why are you posting this now… the link to CNN was updated in February 2013, there have been 5 updates to version 6.1, the first one was to actually fix this “flaw”. Then there are 4 versions of 7.* that do not have this flaw.
This flaw was fixed within days of the Spanish dude exposing it to the world. Anyone who is still running version 6.1 on an iPhone 4s or 5, IMHO, deserves this hack.
We ALL care about security, but HYPING this OLD, outdated issue does NOT help your readers. It only aims to insight them.
Keep your phones up to date on patches, just like your PCs.
@ Ron Farina: “…TERM LIMITS TERM LIMITS IS A START …”
And WITH those BADLY needed Term Limits: JURY SELECTION OF ALL REPRESENTATIVES AND SENATORS!!!!
Just like the local Jury Pool but on THAT level. YES WE MUST. PLEASE think about how we are taxed to death and branded “Domestic Terrists” by the ZioDHS while our BASIC SPECIES-SURVIVAL INTERESTS are represented by NOBODY in today’s SOLD-OUT Congress.
As with the IBM Motto of note and fame: THINK! Let’s SOLVE the PROBLEM. The tools are already in place!
LAWFULLY FORWARD! And that is all. 0{:-|o[
“Security flaws” are intentionally built-in….Bill Gates is cooperating with the government after cutting a deal to sidestep any and all monopoly or unfair trade practices charges…
All of Microsoft’s legal issues just vanished after he started cooperating with the government…have you noticed that?
Speaking of insanity, he and Belinda funded a project to release genetically modified mosquitoes in Africa to deliver “vaccinations” to the population….how bizarre and ludicrous is that?…..
Truth is stranger than fiction….
“It involves using another phone placed nearby to make a call to the phone, canceling it, then answering with the targeted phone and fiddling with the power button.” Am I missing something here? How would a hacker get access to a victim’s phone (targeted phone) unless they left it laying around?
It may seem incredible to the habitually conscientious, but plenty ’nuff fools-with-iPhones (all of whom seem to think that the “SmartPhone” on the coffee table somehow helps THEM look smarter than they ever were) actually DO just leave them laying about the house for “friends” to play with.
The poppy-addicted sector of our crippled populace (growing rapidly too, yes it is, thanks to the Afghanistan Enterprise’s chief export, thank you not-at-all) includes a fair proportion of such clever and vicious meddlers, it turns out – I for one am currently counseling and coaching the estranged and Stockholm-syndrome-addled wife of one such drugs-driven cannibal predator in the basic elements of personal self-preservation because of this and related phenomena. (She’s gaining ground fast; Hubby-in-Rehab-seventh-time-now just HATES it).
Fact: While ensconced with her for the Last Fling, HE “borrowed” her phoneand went off into the night with it to another “friend” for an hour .. A week later SHE started losing REAL friends due to the unrelenting Harassment-by-Junkie that quite evidently emerged from her contact list’s easy breaching.
Evidently, this iTrick has evidently been iAround from the iPhone’s iBeginning. IMVH&fed-up_O, Apple Corporation should be FLOGGED in PUBLIC for allowing the problem to persist this long. EVERY hack victim should be compensated – in TYAX-FREE COURT-ORDERED CLASS ACTION AWARD CASH. And MORE!
And that is by far NOT all. 0{:-|o[
It’s time to demand that funding for all these invasive programs, the NSA goons and any other communist center be cut to $0.
You know, I don’t consider myself a paranoid person, but seriously, there have been so many invasion of privacy things pop up with these new smart phones in the past year one has to wonder if the maker is not intentionally making these breaches. I was reading an article yesterday about the Dept. of Education and their dream of creating “community centers” out of schools with a plan to have school open for up to 13 hrs a day providing for all of the social, emotional and physical needs of the community – sounded like a Nazi day school to me, but the thing that I want to point out is that the primary backers of this Core Curriculum that would be central to such a school model was Bill Gates. They are also funding a ton of technology to be used in these community centers, which sounds very altruistic until you think to yourself, “how would Hitler or Stalin have used today’s technology?” The answer is pretty clear to me, they would use it exactly how our current administration is proposing to use in our schools today. I don’t think it’s a huge leap to wonder if Bill Gates and other high tech folks are aggressively funding Obama and are supportive of his plan to “transform America” then maybe they are putting in these privacy glitches to be used when the time is right, then the government can go on listening to your phone calls and reading your e-mail and doing whatever they wanted with the information they gathered
Right on Christi you get an A++not only is Gates and his lovely so called Catholic wife, funding GMO, for those mentally challenged, that is genetically altered DNA of foods, primarily Soy. They gave a multi million dollar grant to Duke Univ. I believe and I am sure others to put CONTRACEPTIVES in food to curtail population growth. NOW THESE BILLIONAIRES WANT TO DO WHAT THE NAZI’S DID AND THE OBAMA NAZI ADMINISTRATION AND ONE WORLD ORDER CROWD WANT TO DO, CONTROL THE WORLD, OUR LIVES. NOW THEY WANT TO PLAY GOD. This is like a sci fi movie. IF SOMEONE GIVES YOU SOMETHING FOR FREE THEY WANT SOMETHING IN RETURN. OBAMA WANTS THE ZOMBIES TO FOLLOW THE CROWDS INTO THE FEMA CAMPS. If you think this is hysteria, just open your eyes, read what is going on with the world food crises, the dollar devaluation, and eventually the dollar will no longer be the currency of the world. That will cause many things to happen. Food shortages, your dollar will be worthless, fuel costs are projected to go to 10.00 gallon. The deficit is much more that stated, economic conditions are not what they report on the news, on and on.
Just look at why our local police forces now have armored personnel carriers and other millitary type equipment. WAKE UP AMERICA YOU HAVE BEEN DUPED. KEEP WATCHING THE DUMBING DOWN REALITY SHOWS. GO TO http://WWW.VATICANCATHOLIC.COM FOR YOUR NEWS ABOUT THE WORLD, RELIGION THE FALSE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND PAPACY. GO ON YOU TUBE AND LOOK UP JOEL SKOLESON, ALEX JONES, STEVE QUALE AND THEY WILL LINK TO OTHERS IF THEY ARE TOO STRONG FOR YOUR BELIEF SYSTEM. REMEMBER BELIEVE HALF OF WHAT YOU SEE NOTHING YOU HEAR. AMEN SEE YOU ON THE OTHER SIDE. OH BEFORE SENDING THIS I JUST READ THE FOLLOWING MESSAGE. YES YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH FUNDING THE BLACK OPERATIONS IS GETTING TO DO THINGS AGAINST THE PEOPLE. THE GOVT. IS OUT OF CONTROL. TERM LIMITS TERM LIMITS IS A START IN ALL FORMS OF GOVT. LOCAL, STATE, FEDERAL. WE SHOULD ALL KNOW BY NOW POWER CORRUPTS. WASN’T THERE SOMETHING BIBLICAL TO THAT:)