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- #Iphone 5s reset encrypted data update#
- #Iphone 5s reset encrypted data software#
- #Iphone 5s reset encrypted data download#
Which means that applications on the phone, even running at the most privileged level, can not access any of the data within the enclave. Essentially, the SE is a special area of storage on the device that’s encrypted with its own key, and that key is not available to the main application processor. To improve the security of existing elements on the iPhone, and to secure new features such as Touch ID, Apple introduced the Secure Enclave with iPhone 5S.
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So in grand scheme of things, encrypting the firmware doesn’t add too much to the security of the device.
#Iphone 5s reset encrypted data software#
The other reason is to make it more difficult for an attacker to modify and replace the firmware on the phone, but that’s also accomplished using strong software signature validation. Obviously that hasn’t really stopped such practices, and some recent releases of the boot disk haven’t even been encrypted at all. One is to protect the software from hackers who may try to jailbreak the software. There are two reasons why iOS firmware is encrypted. What was released today, then, is the encryption key specific to iOS version 10.3.3 on product “iPhone6,1” (the GSM-only version of iPhone 5S). Though I see now that keys exist for just that device, but not 4S or 6+, and I confess I haven’t been paying attention lately to know just what the current situation is. The iPhone 5S was the first to include the Secure Enclave, but because the boot bug had been fixed, we didn’t have any (easy) way to extract the encryption keys for that device. But that bug was finally fixed in the iPhone 4S, so we couldn’t decrypt firmware for many later devices. It used to be that we could extract the decryption keys directly from devices due to long-standing bugs in the permanent bootrom (the part that’s burned into the device and can’t be updated).
#Iphone 5s reset encrypted data download#
So, even though you can download any of these firmware images from Apple, you can’t actually look inside them unless you have the appropriate key, and these keys vary from release to release and device to device.
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Also, each element of the firmware release may be individually encrypted, with a cryptographic IV and 256-bit AES key.
#Iphone 5s reset encrypted data update#
The overall firmware package includes the root filesystem (the actual unix system that the phone runs), update and restore ramdisks (used, predictably, when updating the phone or restoring from backup), multiple levels of boot code, recovery firmware, and finally, the firmware for the Secure Enclave.Įach release of the OS is tailored to individual devices – the firmware for iPhone 5S is different from that for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6S. Firmware Basicsįirst, what exactly is this we’re talking about? The iPhone has many different elements that together make up the firmware for the device. As I write this, I hope to keep it short, but make no promises. Another excellent reference is the regularly-updated iOS Security document produced by Apple. I’ve written about the SEP before, especially here and here, so I won’t get too deep into the weeds. Some of the articles have been improved (slightly) with additional information from xerub and anonymous sources at Apple, but I thought it’d be a good idea to review this at a more technical level. Stories suggested that this move was “destroying key piece of iOS mobile security,” and that we should “be on the lookout for Touch ID hacks” and “password harvesting scams.” Earlier today, it was reported that a hacker/researcher called “xerub” had released the encryption key, and tools to use it, for the firmware that runs the Secure Enclave Processor (SEP) on iPhone 5S.
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