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iOS 11 Security [pdf]
- neom 9y agoAnyone know if other cell phone vendors publish a document like this?
- josephh 9y agoSamsung: http://www.samsung.com/my/business-images/resource/white-paper/2013/11/Samsung_KNOX_whitepaper_An_Overview_of_Samsung_KNOX-0.pdf http://www.samsung.com/my/business-images/resource/white-pap...
- devinl 9y agoAndroid: https://source.android.com/security/ https://source.android.com/security/
- miles 9y agoCould you please add (PDF) to the title? Didn't HN used to do this automatically? Or did the trailing "?" in the URL break that functionality?
- edanm 9y agoI think it was done manually.
- miles 9y agoLooks like you're right; turns out it's even in the guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html > If you submit a link to a video or pdf, please warn us by appending [video] or [pdf] to the title.
- gervase 9y agoApple seems to be investing heavily in security and privacy, but I'm curious to see if they can actually convince the average consumer to care (and/or buy into their security narrative, depending on your level of cynicism). So far, the convenience and features offered by their competition (at the expense of user privacy) seem to be a stronger draw. I figure either (A) they're trying to carve out a niche of hardcore consumers who do care, or (B) they're trying to play a long game, hoping that broad sentiment shifts towards valuing electronic privacy. If it's the former case, I think they're doing fine; these kinds of whitepapers will reach most of those who care, and periodic news articles ("Terrorist iPhone unable to be unlocked!") will reach the rest. If it's the latter, I think it's a pretty big risk given the scale of their re-education task (the pool of users willing to sacrifice personal privacy for other benefits, i.e. Google and Facebook's bread and butter) and the potential pushback they'll receive/have been receiving from governmental sources. What does HN think? Is this a viable business differentiator for them, long term? Or will they have to shift to the 'dark side' of personalized data and services to remain competitive in the future?
- hemancuso 9y agoI think Apple employs engineers and leadership who care about privacy and security and are willing to marshall the resources to bring that about. I doubt too many customers really truly care.
- make3 9y agothey probably feel like it's part of what a premium phone should feel like on an emotional level, safe.
- radicaldreamer 9y agoThis is more for spurring iOS adoption in enterprise and government than something that is aimed at the consumer.
- canes123456 9y agoSecurity is a hygiene feature. You spend time to avoid negative PR not to sell more phones.
- 5_minutes 9y agoI certainly appreciate this effort, whatever their long term intention or strategy is with this in a commercial way (or not), it’s in line with what I expect when it comes to my privacy and security. Some of the google/Android “features” and what they do with your data, make old school keyloggers look like a joke.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- zython 9y agoPlease tag this as pdf
- samat 9y agoI am wondering if someone could explain Chinese iCloud accounts transfer implications. I see that iCloud Keychain is still secure, but pretty much everything is fucked up, right?
- willstrafach 9y ago> but pretty much everything is fucked up, right? Depends on your definition of "fucked up" in this case. The change is that data for China-based users will need to reside on domestic (Chinese) servers. Any associated implication derived from that would be opinion-based.
- ComodoHacker 9y agoThe purpose of the change is government to have physical access to that data. They have no problem getting iCloud password from any user.
- samat 9y agoApple made it clear that those company would have to iCloud data, too.
- tzahola 9y agoI hope Apple will begin to spin privacy and security as part of their "premium lifestyle". Because if privacy and security will be associated with premiumness, other companies will have an incentive to implement similar measures in their products. People will actually care about their digital privacy for the first time! (though not because of the benefits of privacy, but to show off to others that they can afford a premium product with privacy) Sort of like how companies suddenly started caring about their mobile phones' package design after the iPhone was released with its sleek packaging.
- saagarjha 9y agoHopefully this doesn't backfire though: by associating privacy with a "premium lifestyle", it by definition stops becoming something accessible to everyone and instead something you must pay for.
- jrcii 9y agoI don't trust any multi-billion dollar international corporation, period. To do otherwise is naïve, especially when they have a list a mile long of anti-consumer decisions (sending local file searches to Apple HQ, soldering down your RAM, anyone?)
- drewmcmillan 9y ago>The probability that a random person in the population could look at your iPhone X and unlock it using Face ID is approximately 1 in 1,000,000 (versus 1 in 50,000 for Touch ID) I would love to know the likelihood of this in reality. For example, What about people who look like you? You don't tend to hang around with completely random people, its often parents and siblings who, unlike fingerprints, may bare facial resemblance enough to trick it
- polygot 9y ago"The processor forwards the data to the Secure Enclave but can’t read it. It’s encrypted and authenticated with a session key that is negotiated using a shared key provisioned for each Touch ID sensor and its corresponding Secure Enclave at the factory." > "at the factory" I suppose the secret key is erased at the factory, however, what if it isn't? Or, is the secret key generated on-chip via a random number generator? If it were stored at the factory somewhere then it would be possible to link it to each iPhone. I'm not familiar with cryptography, so I think it's just a misunderstanding on my part, and I'm not sure if this would be a weakness in the Touch ID sensor.
- dfox 9y agoIt is relatively easy to do the negotiation in a way that nothing at the factory ever sees the resulting session secret. DH is obvious and in this case secure approach, but even simply generating random key in one or other end of the secure link and sending it in plaintext for the first time will be essentially sufficient (you still have to trust the environment this happens in to large extent).
- axoltl 9y agoThe long-lived secret for TouchID is generated in the SEP, using the UID of the SoC (a secret known only to the SoC) and the serial number of the respective sensor. That key is then keywrapped with a (symmetric) key known to all TouchID sensors and sent to the fingerprint sensor. It unwraps and verifies the key and burns it into fuses. That key is then used for establishing a session key in the field. The session key uses entropy from both the SEP TRNG and the TouchID TRNG. Your threat means someone would 1. need to know the TouchID global key 2. slurp off all the keywrapped blobs for later, at all iPhone manufacturing sites. This then gives them to ability to either decrypt fingerprints, or feed 'fake' fingerprints to the SEP. Given that there are far easier ways of stealing fingerprints, that leaves the feeding fake fingerprints to the SEP. If you're in a position to do that you might as well just feed the phone a fake finger.
- Sephr 9y agoThose prerequisites aren't necessary if you can figure out how to compromise the secure enclave remotely.
- amckinlay 9y agoApple security is confusing. For example, Find My Mac does not require 2FA even when 2FA is enabled. An attacker can remotely wipe your MacBook with just your iCloud password. Another example: apparently there is a distinction between "two-factor authentication" and "two-step authentication", the later being a deprecated, but active system. Reading the docs for the older system, you'll soon discover differences in things such as account access and recovery that lead to an entirely different set of consequences and caveats for security. You'll find out that in certain scenarios you could permanently lose access to your iCloud account and iTunes purchases under "two-step authentication*, but not the newer "two-factor authentication". If a user confused the two while reading the Apple online support pages, it could have grave consequences. Security is something that needs to be documented and marketed in clear terms. Why Apple would adopt names so similar for two distinct implementations of a security mechanism that they could arbitrarily describe either is incoherent with Apple's supposed model of user friendliness. It's what Microsoft does with its products, not Apple. Additionally, all facets of a security feature should be documented, and documented well. It is unacceptable that Apple does not warn users that 2FA can be bypassed in certain scenarios. I hope Apple does further focus on security, and documenting it well.
- eridius 9y ago> For example, Find My Mac does not require 2FA even when 2FA is enabled. This is intentional. Otherwise people who only have one device would be unable to wipe their device if it gets lost.
- kartickv 9y agoBut that reduces security for someone with multiple devices. Can I enable some option to require 2FA for remote wipe?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- saagarjha 9y ago> An attacker can remotely wipe your MacBook with just your iCloud password. This is not a security/privacy issue–none of your information is leaked. > It is unacceptable that Apple does not warn users that 2FA can be bypassed in certain scenarios. I hope Apple does further focus on security, and documenting it well. Should every password field have a disclaimer that says it can be "bypassed" by someone who knows your password?
- yorby 9y agoWas Steve Jobs in charge of over-viewing security?
- josho 9y agoiCloud Keychain may be surprising for some folks. For example, it can be restored from an iCloud backup only to the same machine. Also, you have no ability to recover your iCloud keychain from your own time machine backups. The reasons, as the document outlines, are for added security. But, having recently wiped my iCloud keychain by resetting Safari's privacy settings and inadvertently loosing all my passwords, I was surprised to discover that I couldn't restore my passwords from my own backups. The upside is a compromised iCloud password doesn't also leak all the keychain passwords.
- cocktailpeanuts 9y ago> "The processor forwards the data to the Secure Enclave but can’t read it. It’s encrypted and authenticated with a session key that is negotiated using a shared key provisioned for each Touch ID sensor and its corresponding Secure Enclave at the factory." If I understand this correctly, IF they're using Diffie Hellman key exchange to generate the shared session key for every chip, doesn't this mean Apple also owns the session key for every single iDevice out there and can crack into them if they wanted to? Does this mean the "security" only protects users from men-in-the-middle, but not from Apple (or NSA if they come after them)?
- axoltl 9y agoThe long-lived secret for TouchID is generated in the SEP, using the UID of the SoC (a secret known only to the SoC) and the serial number of the respective sensor. That key is then keywrapped with a (symmetric) key known to all TouchID sensors and sent to the fingerprint sensor. It unwraps and verifies the key and burns it into fuses. That key is then used for establishing a session key in the field. The session key uses entropy from both the SEP TRNG and the TouchID TRNG. So an 'evil' Apple couldn't crack the session key unless it had been evil all along and storing the generated keywrapped blobs. In which case you're sorta screwed no matter which way you slice it.
- MikeGale 9y agoThis looks like a great example of insecurity through security. Given that Apple is not trustworthy and you need to be able to change and/or inspect a device to have a chance at security, this is a solid strike for a human-thought-free insecure world.
- ploggingdev 9y agoRegarding iCloud accounts, Apple seems to be forcing the usage of phone numbers for 2FA and account recovery without an option to disable it. I switched from an Android device to an iPhone recently and was asked to setup an iCloud account. I went through the setup process and realized that my phone number was setup as a 2nd factor with no option to disable it [0]. For all the talk about Apple devices being the most secure, not many people seem to be complaining about how Apple forces a phone number as a 2nd factor + account recovery method. Most people backup very personal data to their iCloud accounts and forcing users to use a phone number for 2FA and account recovery is ridiculous. IMO Google gets 2FA right : I can setup a Yubikey + Authenticator + backup codes and remove my phone number as a 2FA method. And I also realized that there's no way to delete an iCloud account. I assumed all the big companies will have an option to delete accounts. I hope there's a law mandating all online accounts need to have a clearly defined lifecycle with an option to delete accounts and personal data if users want to. (First time using an Apple device, so I might be misunderstanding the 2FA situation, correct me if I'm wrong.) [0] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204915 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204915
- walterbell 9y agoYou don’t need to use iCloud. Backups can be done locally.
- ploggingdev 9y agoIIRC I wasn't able to download or update apps from the app store without an iCloud account, so an iCloud account is not really optional. Regarding backups, I've disabled all backups to iCloud and upload photos, videos to a google account since I can't directly transfer files to a linux pc.
- walterbell 9y agoYou can. The Apple account needed for the App Store is independent of iCloud. You can create this account on the apple website, then use it to sign into the device (separately from iCloud). Just say no to all requests which ask for iCloud signon, during device setup. You can directly transfer files to a Linux PC (via SFTP, WebDav, SMB) with iOS apps like Transmit, Coda, GoodReader, Briefcase and others.
- ConcernedCoder 9y agoIs this chain-of-trust implementation the reason my backlit-keyboard on my macbook pro won't light up whilst asking me for my password on coldboot? It's a giant pain in the rear to get up and flip on a light when you're in bed programming at night... ( sigh )
- ghews 9y agoI don't think the battery policy is good for us.
- mrblues 9y agoIs it possible to extract data from a locked and turned off iphone 7 or newer device?
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