Rixstep
 About | ACP | Buy | Industry Watch | Learning Curve | News | Products | Search | Substack
Home » Learning Curve

The NSA & iOS

But of course we live in the best of all possible iWorlds.


Get It

Try It

HAMBURG (Rixstep) — Tor developer Jake Appelbaum gave an amazing talk at today's Chaos Communication Congress 30C3. You're encouraged to watch.



Jake's been studying the Snowden documents; his hour-long speech details what the NSA are doing and how they're doing it. Apple's OS X comes off relatively unscathed as most exploits target Windows (natch) and open source platforms such as FreeBSD.

But Apple's iOS isn't so lucky. Herewith four screenshots from the talk.

The first slide names the companies involved. Whether morons or collaborators, people need to know who they can trust. [Jake also points out that Apple didn't begin their collaboration with the NSA until after the passing of Steve Jobs.]

Note iPhone in the bullet list. What the NSA are saying is they're able to implant code on your iPhone (without you detecting it). And unless you broke out of jail, you have precious little chance of auditing your system. And Apple won't alert you either.



This second slide details how the product 'DROPOUTJEEP' works. The slide says:

'DROPOUTJEEP is a software implant for the Apple iPhone that utilises modular mission applications to provide specific SIGINT functionality. This functionality includes the ability to remotely push/pull files from the device. SMS retrieval, contact list retrieval, voicemail, geolocation, hot mic, camera capture, cell tower location, etc. Command, control, and data exfiltration can occur over SMS messaging or a GPRS data connection. All communications with the implant will be covert and encrypted.'



But that's of course only for jailbroken devices or devices that have been misused, right? No. That's only on occasion and it's a tossup if they ever succeed, right?

No. They can get any iPhone they want.



Jake comments that either Apple are collaborating with the NSA or they write some pretty crappy code. Jake thinks Apple write bad code; what do you think?

But isn't this still the best of all possible iWorlds? About the same thing as the walled garden? People are watching us all over and this isn't different. Right?



You're not going to find much of a writeup in the 'Mac media'. They're going to go on ignoring this. Their mission is to keep you frolicking like innocent babes in the woods.

So you choose. But first watch the video above. Happy New Year.

About | ACP | Buy | Industry Watch | Learning Curve | News | Products | Search | Substack
Copyright © Rixstep. All rights reserved.