3 ms·

Why would that be any more than 2x harder?

• zitterbewegung 8y ago
  Because you need two compromises and hacking the secure enclave is a much harder proposition than finding a exploit that allows you to read the memory of an iPhone. Public information about how the secure enclave really works has been hard to come by.
• djrogers 8y ago
  Yes, it absolutely is more than 2x harder. The attack surface of the secure enclave is considerably smaller than the attack surface of the AXX chip as a whole, and you need a significant jailbreak/compromise before you could even target the SE.
• ygra 8y ago
  The secure enclave would have a much smaller attack surface, due to only handling a much smaller set of features, I guess.
• michaelt 8y ago
  General-purpose processors have to be secure while executing untrusted code, providing a large number of features, and providing good performance. The secure enclave isn't subject to these constraints, allowing for more conservative design decisions. You've found a privilege-escalation attack that can let sandboxed apps escape their sandbox? Still secure if the chip can't run apps in the first place. You've found a bug in the USB disk mode emulation code? Still secure if the chip doesn't have any USB code on it. You've found a bug in branch prediction? Still secure if your chip didn't use it. You've found a way to abuse the third party developers' debugging interface? Still secure if your chip provides no such interface...