JVTech News Apple: for the first time, a developer manages to hack iOS
The first iPhone was released in 2007 in our stores. Steve Jobs had hit hard with a real revolution for mobile phones, in addition to wearing the iPhone as a true smartphone institution. Apple doesn’t mess around with the security of their devices, and that’s why the first iOS crack has just been released…
A computer exploit for this iOS hack
After the possibility of using MacOS on any computer via Hackintosh, managing to run iOS 1, the very first operating system of the iPhone is a whole different ballgame. But now, an amateur developer has succeeded in this feat, by running version 1.0 of iOS present on the very first iPhone directly on a computer.
It is the Dutch developer Martijn de Vos, also known as Devos50, who succeeded through what is called reverse engineering, to emulate a full version of iOS, present on the iPod Touch in 2007shortly after the launch of the iPhone.
The project took a lot of time and energy from the developer to succeed in emulating it, in particular because of the multi-touch functionalities and the compatibility with certain specific components. In a blog post, Devos explains that the most difficult part is to emulate certain components of an iPod Touch. Indeed, Apple is, as you know, very reluctant to let users tamper with the bowels of their devices, which then leads to great difficulties in repairing certain models of iPhone or iPod. That’s why Devos tried to circumvent the problem by going directly to emulating an iPod Touch, rather than an iPhone, which requires even more precise hardware to function properly.
Devos specifies that he chose to emulate iOS to exploit it, but also because newer versions of the operating system are even more difficult to crack.
Recent Apple devices have even more components and security modules, and a whole host of sensors that simply prevent emulation.
The developer affirms that the older versions are then the priority target for the developers, who like to reverse engineer the old OS, in order to better understand them. The project became a reality thanks to OpeniBoot, an open source software that makes it easy to launch old Apple software.
So, does it work?
As you can see, Apple knows how to protect its data very well. Apple software remains under protection for many years, even after the new versions of iPhone point the tip of their nose.
Emulation was possible thanks to the QEMU software, an open source visualization platform, which Devos chose for its readability and ease of use. The whole system can be controlled with a keyboard and mouse with pre-installed apps, all of which miraculously work. There are obviously some crash issues but nothing serious knowing that you can literally run the OS of a 2007 smartphone on a computer.
Devos posted full details of the operation in a blog post. If you are a bit of a connoisseur and hacker at heart, this should not be a problem for you. Devos now wants to start emulating an iPhone with iOS 2.1, we never stop progress!