There is a brute force hack that can bypass the code limit of the iPhone [Update: Maybe Not!]

Apple is a perpetual battle to get ahead of the hackers and secure its devices, but a new bug discovered by a security researcher and reported by ZDNet shows that the code that protects iOS devices can be bypassed by a force attack, leaving iPhones and vulnerable iPads. exploited.

Matthew Hickey, a security researcher and co-founder of the cyber security company Hacker House, recently discovered a way around some of Apple's security measures aimed at keeping malicious actors out of the devices. The attack works even on devices running the latest version of iOS.

To understand how the attack works, here's what you need to know: Apple started encrypting iOS devices in 2014. To access this encrypted information, iPhones and iPads require users to enter a password. four or six digits to protect the device. that they choose when first installing the device. If the password is entered incorrectly 10 times, Apple's operating system will erase the device and delete the information forever.

These security measures have been the cornerstone of Apple's privacy policy in recent years and have pissed off law enforcement agencies that could access the iPhone's data by entering endlessly. access codes or asking Apple to retrieve them. (Apple does not have access to a user's access code, so theoretically, only the owner of the device can unlock the iPhone or the iPad.)

What Hickey discovered, according to ZDNet, is a way to bypass the limit of 10 assumptions when entering a password, allowing someone to enter combinations indefinitely until they reach the limit of 10 assumptions. the device is unlocked. All a malicious actor must perform the brute force attack, by Hickey, is "a locked phone turned on and a lightning cable."

In a demonstration video published by Hickey Online, it shows how the attack works. Basically, when the iPhone or iPad is plugged in, an attacker can use the keyboard entries to enter access code assumptions instead of pressing the numbers on the keyboard. screen of the device. When the keyboard inputs occur, it triggers an interrupt request that takes precedence over everything that is happening on the device. An attacker could create a massive string of entries and send them all at once and iOS would allow an endless series of guesswork without erasing the device.

The attack is slow, by entering a single access code every three to five seconds, by ZDNet, which equates to about 100 four-digit codes every hour. But it seems to be effective even against iOS devices running version 11.3 of the mobile operating system. This could make it a valuable tool for government agencies and groups working with law enforcement to crack iPhones. It is not clear if the vulnerability is already used by devices such as GrayShift's GrayKey.

When iOS 12 is released later this year, the brute force attack may lose its value. Apple introduces a new feature called USB Restricted Mode. Once implemented, this feature limits USB access on iOS devices after the iPhone or iPad has been locked for one hour, making the device a black box if it It's not cracked in the first 60 minutes.

Update, June 24, 9:30 am: Apple has rejected Hickey's discovery, saying there is no vulnerability. "The recent report on an access code bypass on iPhone was a mistake, and a result of incorrect tests," said a company spokesman in Gizmodo.

In one tweetHickey said PINs do not always go to Apple's Secure Enclave Processor, which houses the access code. "So, although it seems like the PINs are tested, they are not always sent and so they do not count," he added. wrote. "Devices record fewer accounts than visible."