A12

Electra Team and Pwn20wnd issue status updates regarding the A12(X) jailbreak

Despite the unforeseen bombshell that Saurik recently dropped on the jailbreak community regarding the much-anticipated Cydia Substrate update for A12(X) devices, this hasn’t stopped talented hackers such as those from the Electra and unc0ver jailbreak teams from devising workarounds to ensure that the community gets its cake and eats it too.

The unc0ver jailbreak is perhaps the most impacted jailbreak from the ordeal, as Electra uses Substitute instead of Cydia Substrate. And for that reason, we consider the following words from hacker and unc0ver lead developer Pwn20wnd be to be somewhat significant given the times we’re in:

Saurik to jailbreak community on A12(X) Cydia Substrate ETAs: ‘Knock it off’

If you’ve been following the jailbreak community as closely as I have recently, then you’ve undoubtedly witnessed a lot of denigration between Cydia Substrate naysayers and Substitute naysayers. Some are fed up in waiting for Cydia Substrate to be updated with A12(X) support, prompting many to harass Saurik for a release date and motivating others to take a different approach to jailbreaking entirely.

In response to much of this mud-slinging and toxicity, Saurik took to Twitter Friday morning to bend the jailbreak community over his knee and give it a good spanking. It’s not very often that Saurik makes a public appearance on Twitter, but when he does, it’s almost always a home run:

Pwn20wnd says Saurik plans to update Cydia Substrate for A12(X) devices

Pwn20wnd’s unc0ver jailbreak tool supports all versions of iOS from 11.0-12.1.2, and it supports most iOS devices. The lone exception to the latter part of that statement is that A12(X) devices are only partially supported, which means Cydia and Cydia Substrate won’t be installed on those handsets (yet).

Just last week, Pwn20wnd shared what he still needed to complete the full A12(X) support for unc0ver, and while one of those components has since been completed, the community continues to wait for the other.

Pwn20wnd updates Unrestrict library, bringing us one step closer to a full-fledged A12(X) jailbreak

Pwn20wnd’s unc0ver jailbreak tool supports all iOS versions from iOS 11.0-12.1.2 and most iOS devices in between, but it only partially supports A12(X) devices at the time of this writing because of reasons that we outlined in a piece published earlier this week.

Two of the most significant roadblocks that have prevented a full-fledged A12(X) jailbreak from surfacing are that Cydia Substrate needs to be updated with compatibility for these devices and that Pwn20wnd still needed to update Unrestrict library for sandbox patches on arm64e devices. Fortunately, the latter is no longer a problem as of today.

Pwn20wnd shares what’s left to complete A12(X) support for unc0ver

Hacker and unc0ver lead developer Pwn20wnd first introduced ‘partial’ A12(X) device support for the unc0ver iOS 12 jailbreak tool just under three weeks ago, but as most of the jailbreak community already knows, full support for A12(X) devices won’t be possible until Saurik first updates Cydia Substrate with compatibility for arm64e devices.

In a short spiel Monday afternoon, Pwn20wnd took to Twitter with a small status update for those still wondering about the status of the A12(X) jailbreak:

Pwn20wnd updates unc0ver v3.0.0 to beta 45 to address exploit issue on A12(X) devices

Shortly after releasing an update for the unc0ver v3.0.0 pre-release with ‘partial’ support for A12 and A12X devices, Pwn20wnd dropped yet another revision, bringing the tool up to beta number 45 for public testing.

In a Tweet shared just this afternoon, Pwn20wnd reveals that the somewhat minor update addresses an issue involving the voucher_swap exploit by Brandon Azad on certain beta-centric firmware versions on A12(X) devices:

Unc0ver v3.0.0 beta 44 released with ‘partial’ A12(X) support

Shortly after announcing that he had managed a root filesystem remount on A12 and A12X devices with read and write privileges, hacker and unc0ver lead developer Pwn20wnd has released another revision for the unc0ver v3.0.0 pre-release, bringing the public beta jailbreak tool up to beta version 44.

Citing Pwn20wnd’s announcement on Twitter, unc0ver v3.0.0 beta 44 brings ‘partial’ support for A12 and A12X devices:

Pwn20wnd achieves rootfs remount with read/write privileges on A12(X)

Hacker and unc0ver lead developer Pwn20wnd hasn’t made any significant revisions to the unc0ver v3.0.0 pre-release for a few days now, and as you might come to expect, that’s because he’s been busy attempting to pwn A12(X) devices.

If you fall under the category of ‘currently waiting for A12(X) support,’ then you’ll be excited to hear that Pwn20wnd has made some progress. A Tweet shared Monday afternoon reveals that the hacker has officially achieved a rootfs remount with read and write privileges on his A12 test device:

PsychoTea updates machswap exploit with support for A10-A11 devices

Matrix code hacked iPhone.

In case you missed it, renowned hacker PsychoTea released a noteworthy kernel exploit called machswap for A7-A9 devices running iOS 11.0-12.1.2 on Friday. But rather than slamming on the brakes at the realization of his new exploit, the hacker instead went for the accelerator pedal; consequently, we now have a new and improved exploit that seems viable for jailbreaking.

In a Tweet shared just this weekend, we learn that the machswap exploit has picked up official support for A10-A11 devices in addition to those A7-A9 devices that were previously supported. That said, the machswap exploit is now viable for most devices that can run iOS 12:

S0rryMybad could release an iOS 12 exploit after Apple patches it in a software update

Matrix code hacked iPhone.

Apple first released iOS 12 in mid-September, and it’s seen a host of revisions over the last four months. Despite the continuous fortification of Apple’s mobile operating system, there’s been no shortage of bug and exploit reports encompassing iOS 12.

One of the latest announcements comes by way of security researcher @S0rryMybad, who appears to have happened upon a powerful exploit impacting iOS 12.1.2 and below on pre-A12 devices. But perhaps more importantly, the exploit can allegedly provide tfp0 on Apple’s latest mobile operating system:

KeenLab teases jailbroken iPhone XS Max on iOS 12.1

Every time Apple releases a major new software update for its iOS device lineup, it seems like the talented security researchers over at KeenLab are the first to jailbreak it.

KeenLab was the first to demonstrate a proof-of-concept jailbreak on iOS 12.0 in June and iOS 11.3.1 in April, but now it seems the security firm has found a backdoor into Apple’s iOS 12.1 update, which was only released last week.