The fast-paced world of mobile technology never fails to amaze me, and while hardware development seems to have slowed down, software development is now more fast-paced than ever. One area of development that gets a lot of attention is jailbreaking, and that’s no surprise because yesterday it was announced that an iPhone 7 jailbreak had been developed.
iPhone 7 jailbreak: what you need to know
A week hasn’t passed since it went on sale, and hackers are claiming to have created an iPhone 7 jailbreak. Images have been posted on Twitter showing Cydia, the app store for jailbreak apps, running on the latest iPhone and featuring a jailbroken iOS 10. This was possible due to an unencrypted kernel in a version of iOS 10 Beta.
It was reported at the time that Apple had fixed the problem, but its efforts seem to have been in vain. So just days after consumers got their hands on Apple’s latest handsets, an iPhone 7 jailbreak is ready.
Who created the jailbreak?
So now that you know the iPhone 7 has been freed from the shackles placed upon it by its master, who created this iPhone 7 jailbreak, and will it ever be made public?
The hacker/developer behind this jailbreak is no other than the Italian Luca Tedesco. Known for creating jailbreaks, showing them off and then doing nothing, he’s back. However, this time, he’s gone for Apple’s throat with a bare-faced attack on both the iPhone 7 and iOS 10.
Earlier this month, we saw Tedesco show off his jailbreaking skills with an iOS 10 jailbreak video. This showed an iPad running iOS 10 and Luca, scrolling through apps and pages to show it off. However, Luca has now decided to tease the jailbreak community yet again, as he is the first person to show off a working iPhone 7 jailbreak.
Showing it off
As I mentioned earlier, yesterday a tweet posted on the account of @qwertyyoruiopz showed the Matte Black version of Apple’s latest handset running Cydia. If you’re wondering whether this is a legitimate version of the software, it’s clearly Cydia 1.1.26. Some critics of the image have suggested that it could have been manipulated using Photoshop. However, there’s no way of verifying that either way.
Until there is a video showing the iPhone 7 jailbreak, Tedesco and his claims lack credibility. And if you take into account the fact that he has failed to disclose the method used to create it and the fact that he has not provided a tool so that others can use it, it’s not clear if this is an untethered jailbreak. So far, this iPhone 7 jailbreak looks like a hoax.
Will it ever become public?
If you’re excited about the thought of an iPhone 7 jailbreak, don’t be! Tedesco can create working jailbreaks, but he rarely, if ever, shares them. It’s possible he creates them to them sell his iOS vulnerability findings to Apple, which isn’t a bad thing. However, publicly showing jailbreaks off to people you know could use them without sharing is just bad manners.
So don’t get excited at the thought of having jailbroken apps and tweaks on your iPhone 7 any time soon. Instead, you should enjoy what iOS 10 has given you. Take a look at some of iOS 10’s hidden features as well.
A future jailbreak?
I think it’s very likely that somewhere in the world, hackers or government agencies are working to jailbreak iOS 10. As always, the relentless game that is the search for iOS vulnerabilities continues.
However, recently Apple started to act more quickly to try to lock its iOS users into particular firmware. It does this by quickly refusing to sign older versions of iOS; a recent example would be the refusal to sign iOS 9.3.4.
Would you use a iPhone 7 jailbreak?
Are you a jailbreak user, and if so, would you take advantage of this jailbreak if it ever became public? If the answer is yes, then you’re probably aware of the dangers associated with using one. However, if you have never done so and the iPhone 7 jailbreak would be your first, you should be aware that doing so circumvents certain protections put in place by Apple to aid you.
Furthermore, iOS 10 now has a lot of features which were once only available on a jailbroken device. Also iOS 10 may still have hundreds of hidden features waiting to be uncovered.
