Apple Versus Jailbreakers: Who Will Win?
Posted on | November 20, 2009 | Comments Off
You don’t have to be an Apple junkie to know how much a control-freak Steve Jobs is. That has been his reputation for many years. It’s his tight grip on Apple’s innovation that has become an integral part of their success and longevity. This control has reared its head into the operating system of Apple’s iPhone. Is that for our benefit or not?
Since the debut of the iPhone in the U.S. 2 years ago hackers have been working diligently to get inside it’s OS. At first, hackers (nicknamed jailbreakers) could get the new revolutionary smartphone to work in areas or on networks where it wasn’t available yet. For bragging rights primarily. Today, ‘jailbreakers’ are looking further. They want full control of the iPhone operating system to customize the phone as they wish.
What Is Jailbreaking?
Jailbreaking is a process that allows iPhone and iPod Touch users to run unofficial code on their devices bypassing Apple’s official distribution mechanism, the App Store. Once jailbroken, iPhone users are able to download many applications previously unavailable through the App Store via unofficial installers such as Cydia, Rock App, Icy, and Installer. Cydia is preferred by the community, while Rock App has a small catalog of mainly paid apps. Icy and Installer are officially unsupported by their developers and rarely used. Cydia founder Jay Freeman estimates that 4 million (out of 40 million) iPods and iPhones are jailbroken. – wikipedia.org
Why Jailbreak Your iPhone?
When you open your PC or MAC desktop for the first time, users begin instantly to upgrade and customize their computing environment. The iPhone is as close as your going to get to a handheld personal computer. The level of sophistication and interactivity is a close match to the user experience of your chosen desktop. However, Apple’s tight grasp on the operating system heavily constrains the average consumer with what they can do with it. For instance, what can be downloaded and installed on the iPhone is strictly guarded by Apple’s App store.
I would agree that I would like to have more options that what is available through the App Store. Jailbreaking gives you the ability to install a wider range of 3rd party applications, ring tones and background themes to pimp out your iPhone. Hardcore Jailbreakers can also modify various aspects of phones capabilities to make it more flexible and accessible across many networks. See Wired.com 6 Reasons to Jailbreak Your iPhone.
Sounds Great Eh?
Everyone wants a burger made the way they like it. Should that be the same on your phone? Jailbreakers will say yes. ‘Why not?’ But that does come at a cost. When the phone was released carriers like AT&T discouraged customers from hacking the phone claiming it would void their warranty. That maybe true. But the concerns are greater than this.
The result of hacked phones is a breach of the security framework that protects the phone from other phone users and networks. This poses numerous integrity and security issues.
Hacked phones can give users access to cell towers and cell network’s underpinnings. In an article on Cnet.com (July/09) Apple claimed that:
…by changing the BBP’s (baseband processor) code, “More pernicious forms of activity may also be enabled. For example, a local or international hacker could potentially initiate commands (such as a denial-of-service attack) that could crash the tower software, rendering the tower entirely inoperable to process calls or transmit data. In short, taking control of the BBP software would be much the equivalent of getting inside the firewall of a corporate computer–to potentially catastrophic result.”
Jailbroken phones are also vulnerable to worms and viruses via 3rd party apps, email and downloading content from the Internet. In early November 2009, Ashley Towns, a 21-year-old unemployed programmer from Wollongong, Australia deployed ‘ikee’ – the first iPhone worm.
The potential insecurity is endless. Some are worried that jailbroken phones can be tapped remotely allowing others to steal your signal or ease drop into unsuspecting users.
George Hotz, at 17, was the first to hack the iPhone. He’s 20 now and a hired hand to uncover design flaws in mobile devices. He recognizes now that Jobs and Apple are playing catch up to hackers, trying urgently to identify and cover up potential security holes and shut the door on jailbreakers.
Hotz was quotes in another Wired article posted on CNN that, “Personally I love that Apple keeps the iPhone closed,”. But it won’t stop jailbreakers, who are moved to bring down Apple, to continue to hack away at each new software release.