A Google security researcher has detailed how the company discovered a hacking attack on iPhones to obtain personal information.
The hack was made possible by 12 vulnerabilities, most of which were bugs in Apple’s Safari web browser, and the attack was carried out through websites implanting surveillance software to collect personal data and sending the information to an external exploit server every 60 seconds to transfer.
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The vulnerabilities were uncovered by Google’s Project Zero cybersecurity task force, and Apple fixed the vulnerabilities with a security update rolled out in February (iOS 12.4.1).
News of the vulnerability was released by a Google employee and made headlines just weeks before Apple’s next mobile operating system, iOS 13, is due to launch.
The new software is said to include a new security feature called Sign in with Apple, which will hopefully reduce instances of personal information theft.
This feature lets you sign up with an account on third-party services, but most importantly, you can control whether you share details like age and gender, and even your email address can be hidden by providing a randomly generated account name that Messages are forwarded to your real inbox.
It’s an interesting proposal to address the very real issue of personal data security, and we hope it’s an effective solution.
Along with this feature are several other changes to the software, including dark mode for a grey-black interface that’s less straining on your eyes, and big performance improvements across the board that reduce download size by 50% and the size of app updates could also reduce by 60%.
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Along with the new software, Apple is expected to release its next-generation phone, the iPhone 11, soon. This will be the first iPhone to run iOS 13 out of the box, but beyond that it’s said to have new hardware features such as a triple camera for more photographic versatility and a new A13 chipset for even more performance.