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San Bernardino County tweets it reset attacker iCloud password at FBI's request
- sktrdie 11y agoAny details on this? How did they reset it if iCloud is using standard encryption techniques?
- bgentry 11y agoThe iCloud account was probably owned and managed by the city since it was their phone. Also if the iCloud account in question was pointing at the perpetrator's work email address, the city would have been able to do an email reset.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- jlgaddis 11y agoIt would also be possible for the County to reset it if they were using any of the myriad "MDM" applications.
- randomname2 11y agoAlso reported by Reuters: http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN0VS2GC http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN0VS2GC Some are saying the password reset requested by the FBI prevented a backup and closed the "front door" they already had, forcing the Apple backdoor. The simplest possible explanation for them shutting themselves out has to be incompetence rather than malice, right?
- cinquemb 11y agoSure simplest, but lets not pretend the fbi (or some people within) doesn't have a history of doing sketchy shit and if it were malice it wouldn't be the first time and i doubt it would even be the last if such were the case, you know humans and all lol
- a3n 11y agoThe FBI sent a letter to Martin Luther King suggesting that he kill himself. So yeah, the FBI does have a history of sketchy shit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO#History
- sehugg 11y agoWired reports: "...the company’s engineers had first suggested to the government that it take the phone to the suspect’s apartment to connect it to the Wi-FI there. But since reporters and members of the public had swarmed that crime scene shortly after the shootings occurred, it was likely that any Wi-Fi there had been disconnected" [1] [1] http://www.wired.com/2016/02/apple-says-the-government-bungled-its-chance-to-hack-that-iphone/ http://www.wired.com/2016/02/apple-says-the-government-bungl...
- tlrobinson 11y agoSo plug it back in...?
- tehalex 11y agoActually, iOS devices do not automatically connect to wifi until they are unlocked for the first time after a reboot - I'm not sure about the cellular networks.
- sneak 11y agoThey do connect to cellular networks, but will not do an automatic iCloud Backup unless they are a) on wifi and b) connected to power, so this method would not have worked.
- everly 11y agoSeems like that part is just bad reporting. I presume they mean the Comcast (or whatever provider it is) account is no longer active, not that a router has been simply unplugged (annoyingly, the average user/journalist doesn't understand the relationship between a copper connection, modem, and router/WiFi and that hasn't been helped by Comcast bundling them as a single device). It would still be relatively trivial to restore the connection so it's not a valid reason for requiring the backdoor, but I think that was the writer's intent. Also, even if they didn't restore the broadband at the guy's apartment, couldn't they just take the router and plug it in back at the station, since the login credentials have already been established? Even the mention of the reporters swarming the apartment highlights the absurdity of the FBI's logic. How can they justify needing to scour every last digital crevice when they couldn't even be bothered to secure and scour the physical space they had access to?
- sigmar 11y agoBut even if it was incompetence, the February 19th Motion to Compel they stated that the owner of the phone tried to reset the password. Which seems a bit disingenuous if the FBI told them to do it. PDF of the motion to compel (Page 18, footnote 7): http://www.wired.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Apple-iPhone-access-MOTION-TO-COMPEL.pdf http://www.wired.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Apple-iPhone...
- randomname2 11y agoSo the county and the FBI are blaming each other? Or is this the FBI carefully parsing words by saying the owner of the phone (i.e. the attacker's employer) tried to reset the password, without mentioning that said reset was done at the FBI's request?
- jlgaddis 11y ago... and without mentioning that it was, apparently, successful. Let's not let the details get in the way.
- digikata 11y agoIf it is malice - the order for Apple to help should be reversed. If it is incompetence then that bolsters the argument that any backdoor will lead to leaks and unauthorized access to the backdoor, causing more harm to everyone.
- a3n 11y agoWe fucked up the front door, but we totally won't fuck up the back door.
- WalterSear 11y agoAnd we can totally be trusted not to share your house keys with anyone.
- a3n 11y agoIndeed. The best way to not have information stolen is to not have it, and particularly not have with someone proven to be incapable of security. http://www.softwar.net/stupid.html http://www.softwar.net/stupid.html EDIT: add after the comma.
- Cartwright2 11y ago> We fucked up the front door, but we totally won't fuck up the back door. This is the most apt summary of this whole situation. I expect to see a family-friendly version of this phrase in the media over the coming days.
- rhino369 11y ago>If it is incompetence then that bolsters the argument that any backdoor will lead to leaks and unauthorized access to the backdoor, causing more harm to everyone. The backdoor the FBI wants to exploit cannot be leaked. They are specifically requesting it be limited to the specific phone. If it were possible to take an apple update, edit it, and then apply to other phones, they wouldn't need Apple's help.
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- stepanhruda 11y agoWe are too incompetent to use the front door. Can you make a back door for us? We for sure won't messing anything up when working with it, what makes you think so?
- pmarreck 11y agoFBI? Definitely incompetence. One of us should help them out. ;)
- ryao 11y agoAm I the only one surprised an Internet meme claiming FBI stands for "Full Blown Incompetence" has not started?
- jessaustin 11y agoThe simplest possible explanation for them shutting themselves out has to be incompetence rather than malice, right? I don't know why so many people feel better about incompetence than they do about malice. Malicious parties can at least be expected to act in their own interests, even if in reprehensible fashion. Incompetent parties might do anything at all, e.g. permanently damaging our communications infrastructure for a chance at short-term political advantage.
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- obsurveyor 11y agoWhy would you ever do this with the real device without thoroughly testing the circumstances with a stand-in first? From a technical perspective, it seems very simple and easy to replicate before actually doing it and locking yourself out completely like they seem to have done.
- johnminter 11y agoYes. The analytical chemist's credo: never test an irreplaceable sample using an untested procedure. Or as Norm Abrams from This Old House put it, "Measure twice, cut once." Spares one that embarrassing moment when you say, "I cut it off twice and its still too short." :)
- tomschlick 11y agoShit they didn't even have to do that. A simple phone call to Apple saying "Hey if we reset this password how much are we going to fuck everything up?" would have sufficed. Straight amateur hour over at the FBI
- jedberg 11y agoI've worked with the FBI and the Secret Service investigating computer crime. The Secret Service is extremely competent when it comes to computer forensics, and when they don't know what to do, they don't guess, the consult with experts. The FBI is the opposite in every way, mostly because of budget constraints and the subsequent lack of training. I hope that this is a good learning opportunity for them and a chance for them to increase their training budget in this area.
- m3rc 11y agoAlso hearsay personal experience but a friend of a friend had his house raided by the FBI and all his computer equipment impounded. When he got it all back they told him his hard drives were empty or unformatted. He had them all formatted as ZFS...
- rpgmaker 11y ago> When he got it all back they told him his hard drives were empty or unformatted. Maybe that's what they wanted him to think. I refuse to believe the alternative...
- pjc50 11y agoWhy? It's people following a forensics script/program which looks for Windows partitions. There aren't a huge number of people who understand this kind of thing and most of them are able to work at places where they're paid much better than the FBI.
- leeoniya 11y agoYou're going to go through the trouble to get a warrant for a raid and then apply such gross incompetence to the seized evidence? When was the last time you pulled a hard drive out of a functioning machine, found it to be empty and didn't immediately think, "huh, that's odd" before throwing it in the trash. I guess it depends on whether the hard drives were the target of the raid or just a collateral of "grab anything that may be useful" mindset. They could already have gathered enough evidence without needing to waste time/money on digital forensics. Hard to say without specifics. The fact that they went out of their way to assure him that his own hard drives were empty reeks of manipulation. Color me highly skeptical.
- vermontdevil 11y agoWonder if folks realize this is the work phone not the personal one. The personal phone was destroyed by the terrorists. I doubt there's anything of value on the work phone. But then again obviously FBIs long term goal is to break in all the phones regardless of the circumstances.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- pteredactyl 11y agoYour tax dollars at work...
- dawnerd 11y agoHonest question: If the county reset the password, couldn't they reset it again and gain access?
- striking 11y agoThey have access to the iCloud backup, but they want access to the phone's contents. The backup is more than a month old.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- spoondan 11y agoThere are separate passcodes for the phone and for iCloud. An iOS device will automatically sync a backup to iCloud once a day if iCloud backups are enabled provided the phone is connected to power and a wifi network. When you first enable iCloud, the phone requests your iCloud password and stores it. If you change your iCloud password, automatic syncing is disabled until you unlock the phone and enter your new iCloud password there. The FBI cannot unlock the phone. By changing the iCloud password, they have made it so that the phone cannot even possibly sync without first being unlocked. Knowing the iCloud password is of no utility for them.
- awqrre 11y agoI don't really understand how a backdoor doesn't already exist if Apple can reset passwords for encrypted data...
- bogus- 11y agoApple has the encryption keys for data stored on iCloud servers. The FBI wants a backdoor into the phone itself.
- cmurf 11y agoI don't think Apple is in the key escrow business anymore; on OS X they had such an option, to show the user the DEK and optionally store it. I don't think the DEK or KEK are backed up at all in iCloud. If you forget your password, all options I see involve device erasure.
- daxelrod 11y agoIt's hard to find this information on Apple's website. According to https://theintercept.com/2014/09/22/apple-data/ https://theintercept.com/2014/09/22/apple-data/ > Apple encrypts your iCloud data in storage, but they encrypt it with their own key, not with your passcode key, which means that they are able to decrypt it to comply with government requests. Not sure if things have changed since then.
- nier 11y agoiOS backups made by the iCloud service seem to be stored unencrypted on Apple’s servers.
- wil93 11y agoIt wouldn't add security anyway. In order to encrypt data, they first need to read it unencrypted. Thus, they can't advertise iCloud as "we can't see your pictures", because they can, in theory.
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- nxzero 11y agoOh, shit, FBI is either stupid, or more likely, has the data and playing the field.
- lasdfas 11y agoWhy can't the FBI just work directly on the phone hard drive (removed the hard drive from the phone and connect it to another computer)? Why are the going through IOS operating system?
- skocznymroczny 11y agoThe hard drive content is encrypted. Assuming there are no backdoors, seems like the only thing they can try is to make bruteforcing easier.
- darylteo 11y agoShould note that John McAfee is offering to "break the encryption" of the data within 3 weeks of commencement using "social engineering". His intentions: good. His success probability: unlikely (unless they have knowledge of how the encryption key is built from the passcode) Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/john-mcafee-ill-decrypt-san-bernardino-phone-for-free-2016-2?IR=T http://www.businessinsider.com/john-mcafee-ill-decrypt-san-b...
- jessaustin 11y agoSocial engineering? "Mr. Cook, it's John McAfee on line three, again. He says, quote, 'pretty pretty please.'"
- lasdfas 11y agoThe FBI wasn't asking for the device to be decrypted. They were asking for a new operating system to be installed that circumvented the 10 wrong tries and the phone is erased. My original question still stands
- mindslight 11y agoThe half-solution security chip plus the device's software form a psuedo trusted computing module. It does seem that if the FBI desoldered the security chip and subpoenaed the KDF algorithm, they could recover the raw encryption key using their own hardware. But perhaps I'm missing a detail.
- ktRolster 11y agoThe FBI is looking worse and worse here
- drivingmenuts 11y agoHope the judge recognizes the apparent level of incompetence demonstrated by this case. That should be enough to get the FBI's request overturned. But it probably won't be.
- ktRolster 11y ago> Hope the judge recognizes the apparent level of incompetence demonstrated by this case. I don't think competence is particularly relevant to the laws in this case....
- DrewHintz 11y agoHere's the tweet: "The County was working cooperatively with the FBI when it reset the iCloud password at the FBI's request." https://twitter.com/countywire/status/700887823482630144 https://twitter.com/countywire/status/700887823482630144
- doxcf434 11y agoI wonder what data the FBI thinks is on the phone that wouldn't be available via other means such a call logs, email, cell tower pings.
- dangson 11y agoiMessages for one. They're encrypted and aren't stored on Apple's servers, but are easily accessible (no password on the app) once the phone has been unlocked.
- largote 11y agoWhat kind of work-issued device is not put on an enterprise management policy? (a.k.a. the employer should be able to unlock it)
- matart 11y agoAbsolutely, I worked for a small department at a University and we had to use the management policy to get emails
- cmurf 11y agoWhat's with this stupid 'terrorist's communication device of choice' meme? Oh wait, it's not a meme because no one but the FBI uses it, it's a propaganda ploy. Let's test this: U.S. dollar is the criminal and terrorist currency of choice. We must therefore, of course, break the dollar. Ok, fail.
- mortdeus 11y agoYou people seriously want me to believe that it was the fbi's incompetence that led to the gov throwing away their only get in free card for the most popular American phone used to coordinate the only substantial ISIS affiliated attack on US soil. Come on now, do you guys seriously think that this was unintentional? You don't put rookies on this and I'd seriously be surprised if the NSA wasn't involved in this matter personally. The government wants a back door installed into all iPhones period. I mean how do you expect apple to build a tool that can bypass the same security features the government is trying to deal with right now without them inadvertently letting everybody and their mother know that there is some fatal flaw in the security layer of every modern iphone and/or iTunes. There's no magic way to fine tune a tool like this and if out spy agencies don't know this then god help us all. Isis is probably gonna win. rolls eyes I mean jail breaking is one thing. This is vault busting and once people know there's a bug and where to look they will find it and exploit it. And apple's only remedy will be to patch the backdoor. Which is obviously what the gov is trying to prevent apple from being able to do by getting a precedent established in the courts that wags a finger at Apple saying "ah, ah, ah you didn't say the magic word" Please goddamnit! The gov doesn't want to be Samuel l Jackson anymore. They want to reverse the roles and this case is the perfect cover. Just like the gov exploited the bombing on 9/11 to pass the patriot act. This is no different.
- jpgvm 11y agoI would like to see Apple implement a new firmware signing scheme that requires the user to sign the firmware using a key generated on that device and not backed up that is protected by the passcode etc. Once initialised the device will only accept updates signed with this key and upstream updates would be verified against the Apple key before being signed with the local key. This would eliminate this vector and not drastically effect the usability of the device. Though it would also need a way to fully reset the device including the removal of this signing key in order to bring the device back to factory settings in the case of loss of the device specific signing key.
- ryao 11y agoIf Apple did write the firmware that the FBI wants and then signed it, would changing the device UUID hard coded into the firmware not invalidate the signature? Is the concern that there are somehow other signing keys in the chain of trust that exist outside of Apple that would make it a general exploit or is the concern that they would be a much lower threshold for getting this sort of thing? Apple might have a point if it is the latter, but if it is the former, the security of the iPhone is already compromised.