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Apple Quietly Introduced iPhone Reboot Code Which is Locking Out Cops (www.404media.co)

submitted 1 week ago by Stopthatgirl7@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

264 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Apple quietly introduced code into iOS 18.1 which reboots the device if it has not been unlocked for a period of time, reverting it to a state which improves the security of iPhones overall and is making it harder for police to break into the devices, according to multiple iPhone security experts.

On Thursday, 404 Media reported that law enforcement officials were freaking out that iPhones which had been stored for examination were mysteriously rebooting themselves. At the time the cause was unclear, with the officials only able to speculate why they were being locked out of the devices. Now a day later, the potential reason why is coming into view.

“Apple indeed added a feature called ‘inactivity reboot’ in iOS 18.1.,” Dr.-Ing. Jiska Classen, a research group leader at the Hasso Plattner Institute, tweeted after 404 Media published on Thursday along with screenshots that they presented as the relevant pieces of code.

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[–] Teknikal@eviltoast.org 24 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I think this used to be possible with tasker, ironically though probably not anymore before of all Google's restrictions on Android. (maybe if you have root)

[–] ProgrammingSocks@pawb.social 11 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

GrapheneOS periodically (once a day or so) forces me to put in the passcode. If this isn't a stock Android feature that's another reason to use Graphene. It also has a "lockdown" button in the power button menu that forces the same behaviour.

[–] Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee 9 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Pretty sure it's stock android, my phone does it every so often as well.

[–] NormalPerson@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago

Sho does, annoys the hell outta me when it happens but I'd never disable that feature

[–] FrozenHandle@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

And grapheneOS also reboots if it hasn't been unlocked in the past 36 hours. Maybe the amount of time is different by default though, I might have changed it.

[–] sudoer777@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 week ago

I have mine set to 18 hours