You know that iPhone you are holding. The one with the password and encryption. I hate to tell you, but it’s been cracked.
Russian security firm Elcomsoft is behind this crack and the team over there is smart. They took a brute-force password cracker and bundled it with a decryption tool that uses established methods to crack iOS devices. The firm is now selling the toolset commercially to individuals, governments and law enforcement.
If a thief gets a hold of your iPad or encrypted iTunes backup, don’t worry about it spilling all your secrets. Elcomsoft will only sell the decryption tool to official agencies like law enforcement and the system needs both your backup and the iOS device to get any sensitive information.
Yeah, the password cracker may be available to anyone with a credit card, but a thief would have to be pretty hard-core to wait for a brute-force attack to guess the right combination. That’s assuming you didn’t take the easy was out by using a simple passcode like 1-2-3-4. [Ars Technica]