2009-11-11




Jailbreaking iPhones Opens Them Up to Security Risks

Image representing iPhone as depicted in Crunc...Image via CrunchBase

Just in case and because it's interesting ...



Daring Fireball Linked List: Hacker Tool Copies Personal Info From Compromised Jailbroken iPhones

Twitter / Dino A. Dai Zovi: Also, remember that jailbr ...


In addition to allowing you to install apps from places besides the Apple iPhone/iPod App Store, jailbreaking disables code-signing and dramatically decreases the security systems of the phone.  Jailbreaking removes a great deal of built-in security, and installing/enabling SSH opens up remote attacks due to the fact the all iPhones have the exact same root password by default.  This is not normally an issue, since there is no way to use it.  But SSH provides a remote access method to use the root password allowing your iPhone to be remotely pwned!

Many jailbreakers probably will not take the logical next step of changing the root password, which just makes this all worse.  To most people this should be obvious: if you break the security of a device to allow you to do things that had not been allowed, it follows that it will be easier for other people to do things you would rather not be allowed.  But convenience and security are sometimes at odds, and this may be one of those occasions.

I guess we'll all get to see how many people have jailbroken their iPhones by seeing how big of a story this becomes ...





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