Just a few days ago, Italian hacker Luca Todesco released the Yalu102 jailbreak for the iOS 10.2. The tool is still in beta stage. With recent beta releases, Todesco has added support for the iPhone 5S and later (except for the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus), the iPad Pro, iPad Air, and iPad mini 2 and later, and the sixth generation iPod Touch.
Have you saved the SHSH2 blobs for iOS 10.2?
The pace of jailbreak releases has certainly slowed as Apple is patching loopholes with every update to its mobile operating system. If you have jailbroken your iOS 10.2 device, you’ll end up losing the jailbreak when you update to the iOS 10.2.1 or the upcoming 10.3. With the frequency of new jailbreak releases dropping significantly, you should protect your iOS 10.2 jailbreak for as long as possible.
One simple way to preserve your jailbreak is to save your SHSH2 blobs. Unfortunately, Apple has stopped signing the iOS 10.2. It means if you haven’t already saved the blobs, you are out of luck. If you were smart enough to save the SHSH2 blobs, you will be able to restore to 10.2 if and when you need to start on the respective firmware from scratch.
Block OTA updates to preserve your jailbreak
The second method to preserve your iOS 10.2 jailbreak is to block the over-the-air updates to the operating system. That way Apple won’t be able to download and install the update on your device. It’s annoying when you don’t want to install an update but the iOS keeps nagging you about it. Is there really a trick to block the updates to newer versions? Fortunately, yes.
You will have to download and install an Apple TV beta profile on your iPhone or iPad. Here’s how to do it:
- If you see a pending software update in the Settings app, delete it by going to Settings > General > Storage & iCloud usage. Now select Manage Storage, find the pending update, and tap on Delete Update
- Launch Safari browser on your iPhone or iPad and go to this link
- Install the tvOS 10 beta software profile. Make sure that the profile is trusted
- Reboot the device
Why it works
Now if you head over to Settings > General > Software Update, you won’t see an update even if you are an older version of iOS. It works because the Apple TV profile enrolls your iPhone or iPad into the tvOS beta program. When your device looks for a new version of iOS, it finds only tvOS betas and assumes that no update is available.
If at any point you want to upgrade or downgrade from the jailbroken iOS 10.2, just remove the tvOS beta profile and restart your device.
Apple has rolled out the iOS 10.2.1 to the public, and pushed out 10.3 beta 1 to developers. It is too early to says whether there will be a jailbreak for 10.2.1 or 10.3. Luca Todesco has stated that he would stop working on public iOS research after the iOS 10.2 jailbreak release.
