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Student hacked into Apple servers and downloaded 90GB of ‘secure files’

15 points by plasticchris 8y ago

platinumrad 8y ago
> The teen – who is said to be well-known in the hacking community – used VPNs and other tools to try to avoid being traced, but Apple’s systems logged the serial numbers of the MacBooks used to carry out the attacks. How could Apple have managed to log the serial numbers?
- haney 8y ago
  Yeah this article is kind of light on technical details. I’d love to see an in depth postmortem and see what Apple’s mitigation plan is.
- kevin_b_er 8y ago
  Sounds like Apple programs macbooks to phone home with serial numbers?
  - jbaczuk 8y ago
    Probably didn't help to hack the company that makes the laptop he was using to hack.
- eatfish 8y ago
  I expect they correlated logs from several sources, maybe the guy connected via ssh to Apple's servers at the same time his mac accessed software update or something. If he sent all traffic down the VPN it'd show the same IP address at Apple.
- dTal 8y ago
  Bear in mind this is filtered through a prosecutor, so is likely highly garbled: >"A mobile phone and hard drive were also seized and the IP address ... matched the intrusions into the organisation." This is clearly nonsense, the IP address as Apple saw it isn't likely to be anything recoverable from the devices - even if they logged past IPs, they are likely NATed. My guess is the attack involved SSH (the article mentions "authorized keys") and Apple logged the SSH fingerprint of the accessing computer.
protondonor 8y ago
Just imagine how a trillion $ company gets hacked by a teenager.
- lern_too_spel 8y ago
  And then doesn't disclose the breach to its customers.
  - valuearb 8y ago
    What breach? Kid could have downloaded 90 gigs of encrypted data he couldn’t decrypt.
    - lern_too_spel 8y ago
      > Further analysis found that the schoolboy successfully accessed “authorised keys” as part of his offending. > Authorised keys grant log-in access to users and are said to be extremely secure. > The Crown prosecutor also acknowledged that Apple was “very sensitive about publicity”. More sensitive about publicity than about security, apparently.
codehusker 8y ago
This 9to5mac article is a summary of a MacRumors article which is a summary of the original article from The Age. https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/melbourne-teen-hacked-into-apple-s-secure-computer-network-court-told-20180816-p4zxwu.html https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/melbourne-teen-h...
- jbaczuk 8y ago
  "computerised tunnels and online bypassing systems"

15 points by plasticchris 8y ago

> The teen – who is said to be well-known in the hacking community – used VPNs and other tools to try to avoid being traced, but Apple’s systems logged the serial numbers of the MacBooks used to carry out the attacks. How could Apple have managed to log the serial numbers?

haney 8y ago
Yeah this article is kind of light on technical details. I’d love to see an in depth postmortem and see what Apple’s mitigation plan is.
kevin_b_er 8y ago
Sounds like Apple programs macbooks to phone home with serial numbers?
- jbaczuk 8y ago
  Probably didn't help to hack the company that makes the laptop he was using to hack.
eatfish 8y ago
I expect they correlated logs from several sources, maybe the guy connected via ssh to Apple's servers at the same time his mac accessed software update or something. If he sent all traffic down the VPN it'd show the same IP address at Apple.
dTal 8y ago
Bear in mind this is filtered through a prosecutor, so is likely highly garbled: >"A mobile phone and hard drive were also seized and the IP address ... matched the intrusions into the organisation." This is clearly nonsense, the IP address as Apple saw it isn't likely to be anything recoverable from the devices - even if they logged past IPs, they are likely NATed. My guess is the attack involved SSH (the article mentions "authorized keys") and Apple logged the SSH fingerprint of the accessing computer.

protondonor 8y ago

Just imagine how a trillion $ company gets hacked by a teenager.

lern_too_spel 8y ago
And then doesn't disclose the breach to its customers.
- valuearb 8y ago
  What breach? Kid could have downloaded 90 gigs of encrypted data he couldn’t decrypt.
  - lern_too_spel 8y ago
    > Further analysis found that the schoolboy successfully accessed “authorised keys” as part of his offending. > Authorised keys grant log-in access to users and are said to be extremely secure. > The Crown prosecutor also acknowledged that Apple was “very sensitive about publicity”. More sensitive about publicity than about security, apparently.

codehusker 8y ago

This 9to5mac article is a summary of a MacRumors article which is a summary of the original article from The Age. https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/melbourne-teen-hacked-into-apple-s-secure-computer-network-court-told-20180816-p4zxwu.html https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/melbourne-teen-h...

jbaczuk 8y ago
"computerised tunnels and online bypassing systems"