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iPhone Can Phone Home And Kill Unauthorized Apps?

Submitted by Edward Kirk on August 6, 2008 - 3:54pm.
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Jonathan Zdziarski, author of the books "iPhone Open Application Development" and the iPhone Forensics manual, found one day while conducting a forensic examination of an iPhone 3G that the code in the new 2.x software that phones home to Apple to check if an application is authorized. That's pretty scary, but what's even scarier is that if it checks as unauthorized, the iPhone will then disable it.

“This suggests that the iPhone calls home once in a while to find out what applications it should turn off. At the moment, no apps have been blacklisted, but by all appearances, this has been added to disable applications that the user has already downloaded and paid for, if Apple so chooses to shut them down.

“I discovered this doing a forensic examination of an iPhone 3G. It appears to be tucked away in a configuration file deep inside CoreLocation.”

On one hand, it might be able to tell if an app has had the DRM stripped, which would help cut down on app piracy. Or maybe it could be used to kill apps that have been discovered to be malicious, which would be a big boost to security. On the other hand, this might possibly be a problem for those of us who managed to purchase NetShare during the brief periods that it was available, which is pretty scary. Even scarier is the thought of Apple using this to disable unofficial apps installed through jailbreaking. If that ends up being the case, then hopefully the Dev Team will be able to get around it using the Pwnage tool.

[via iPhone Atlas]

Submitted by prince on August 6, 2008 - 4:19pm.
GET THE F*CK OUTTA HERE...... THAT'S SCARY AS HELL....

just emagine what ealse they colud get from your freakin phone?

i mean your phone has all the storeg in it 8GB and higher... what if they record our phone calls and then it calls the CIA's phone and give it to them...

HOLLY F*CKIN GOD.

idiot

Submitted by Unregistered (not verified) on August 6, 2008 - 4:39pm.
Dude hopefully your not that shallow to be what you just wrote lay off the green...

Quote:
Originally Posted by prince View Post
GET THE F*CK OUTTA HERE...... THAT'S SCARY AS HELL....

just emagine what ealse they colud get from your freakin phone?

i mean your phone has all the storeg in it 8GB and higher... what if they record our phone calls and then it calls the CIA's phone and give it to them...

HOLLY F*CKIN GOD.

Invasion of Privacy

Submitted by Unregistered (not verified) on August 6, 2008 - 5:44pm.
I wouldn't go as far as the first person did, but this really bothers me. Monitoring calls is probably a stretch, but if this thing can read data in your phone it can easily get to e-mails and other private/sensitive information in anyones iPhone. I don't like this one bit...

Yep

Submitted by ScooterMac on August 6, 2008 - 6:05pm.
I heard on one of the podcasts that this person had that NetShare application on their phone (they downloaded it via the phone, .....not via iTunes), and when they synced the next time, iTunes removed it from the iPhone without them doing anything. (NetShare is that app that was removed from the App Store)
So, yep, they definitely have the ability to remove apps from your phone that they don't want on there.
Wow.........
I'm not that worried about it myself, but you do get tired of them trying to control every little thing on the iPhone.

Submitted by Unregistered (not verified) on August 6, 2008 - 7:54pm.
Thsi is scary but I can tell you that there is a "bug" that is out wild already that makes your legit apps non-executable.

I have bought numerous apps from the app store and as well as some free apps. It turned out that my apps are no longer executable after a recent iTunes sync due to some authorization bugs. I have almost tried everything to resolve this issue. Reinstalling without deleting and redownloading the copy of app on iTunes does not fix it.

The "easiest" way so far is to delete my apps from the iTunes and iPhone, buy them again on iTunes to reinstall. This involves losing all application data (such as to-do, expense, wine logs etc.) I also had to pay double to redownload it just to get it to run on iPhone. The iPhone offers no way for you to "reauthorize" my apps. I am not going to buy from them anymore.

Jailbroken apps all work just fine. (Without intervention from Apple, yet)

This is the worst that can happen to a customer, not getting what he has paid for with the hard earned dollars. Thanks Apple for all the trouble.

Scary, Somewhat Necessary, But Must Be Hacked!

Submitted by brandenwan on August 6, 2008 - 9:51pm.
I think its a semi-good, semi-bad "feature" (I just love when companies call things that.) I think it is good so that Apple can remove malicious software, but bad for snooping on ones iphone and turning off apps. I would like to know what gives Apple the right to arbitrarily switch things off without your permission, and whats more, that is there a clause that stated they can do this, even if you have paid for an app already? (like 'netshare') Even crappy ole Microsoft ALWAYS gives you some kind of choice/warning. What's up with Apple!? They really do have a 'god' complex, don't they? Well, I'm not going to worry too much about this "feature" 'cuz I can already hear the Dev Team singing to Apple... "Every breath you take, every move you make, every bond you break, every step you take, I'll be watching you!" heheheheehehe!!!!! GO DEV TEAM (Are they part Borg? It would seem resistance is futile towards them)

Submitted by Kevin Dunahee on August 6, 2008 - 9:56pm.
Yeah that is pretty ridiculous. So I wonder how much of my network connection and CPU goes to checking pages of apps for legitimacy. It is scary though. I don't very much care for the idea of them taking apps I bought. Granted, they haven't done it yet, but it's an uncomfortable thought for sure.

apple is going crazy

Submitted by thuggedout on August 7, 2008 - 7:00am.
This would be terrible if it is true. Invasion of privacy and Big Brother watching your every move is an understatement. This would disappointment me if I notice apps not working. I paid for my phone and I pay my phone bill, I should be able to do anything to my phone if I want to. Jailbreak it, unlock it, keep it as is. I shouldn't have to worry about apple hacking into my phone and customizing it the way that think it should be.

Submitted by Unregistered (not verified) on August 7, 2008 - 6:09pm.
To the person who said netshare was removed after a friend downloaded it using the phone,was because they synced apps, and the app was not in their itunes..

I agree.

Submitted by Bernie on August 8, 2008 - 6:16pm.
If the app is not in your iTunes it will get zapped. Kind of like ringtones and updates.