A rootfs remount is being released for iOS 12, raising hope for a normal iOS 12 jailbreak with Cydia

Avid jailbreakers who are on iOS 12.0-12.1.2 currently have one of two options: 1) use rootlessJB 3.0, a developer-centric, SSH-based rootless jailbreak without Cydia; or 2) wait for a full-featured jailbreak solution with Cydia (like Electra or unc0ver) to surface. Fortunately, those who are stuck in the latter boat could be one step closer to jailbreaking as of this weekend.

Hackers @MiscMisty and @Lakr223 took to Twitter early Saturday morning to display a proof of concept of a working iOS 12.x-oriented rootfs remount. But perhaps more importantly, they noted how they would be releasing it very shortly.

For those unaware, a remount is a vital puzzle piece in jailbreak development and can facilitate the conception of a standard jailbreak with Cydia. Hacker and rootlessJB 3.0 developer Jake James explains it best via a series of Tweets shared shortly after the announcement:

From what we can gather, the remount release will help tremendously as jailbreak developers scramble to produce and release the first Cydia-supported public jailbreak for iOS 12, but one hurdle remains, and that’s a proper CoreTrust bypass.

James also says that the rootlessJB 3.0 jailbreak tool will continue down its current path as a rootless jailbreak, and that it won’t receive Cydia support despite the newfangled remount due to the extensive work that would be necessary to adapt each of its dependencies.

Fortunately, hacker and unc0ver lead developer Pwn20wnd appears to be investigating the situation. Pwn20wnd Tweeted this morning that he successfully remounted the root filesystem on iOS 12 with read and write permissions:

Update #1 @ 1:40 P.M. ET: Pwn20wnd replied to our post, adding that he would be releasing what he had “in a bit:”

Update #2 @ 2:02 P.M. ET: Pwn20wnd has released experimental iOS 12 remount support for unc0ver, but it is not yet ready for the public:

Update #3 @ 2:13 P.M. ET: Pwn20wnd said that the unc0ver v3.0.0 pre-release would adopt support for the rootfs remount whenever the patch finders are ready and everything works across all devices:

While this is all great news for the jailbreak community, it remains to be seen how much longer it might take to achieve a fully-functioning iOS 12 jailbreak with Cydia. For now, all we can do is wait, see, and speculate.

Are you excited about all the iOS 12-centric advancements in the jailbreak community as of late? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.