At a recent MobilePwn2Own contest that took place in Tokyo researchers were able to breach iOS 11.1’s security two times using Wi-Fi and Safari browser based exploits. The device on which iOS 11.1 was hacked is said to be an iPhone 7. Both breaches were made by Tencent Keen Security Lab, who won $155,000 as a result of these two hacks.
For the Wi-Fi hack, Tencent Keen Security Lab had to use four bugs in order to gain code execution and escalate privileges, that would allow them to install rogue app and make it persist through a reboot. For the Safari browser hack they only had to use two exploits to install rogue app and persist it through a reboot, and they were able to demonstrate their exploit in just a few seconds.
Now that exploits have been demonstrated, the white hat hackers will report them to Apple, which will have 90 days to fix these bugs after which they will be released to public.
With the discovery of these iOS 11.1 exploits one can rest assured that a jailbreak for iOS 11.1 is very possible and the operating system is jailbreak-able. The vulnerabilities are there, and with hackers being able to install apps and have them persist through a reboot, it is possible that same can be done with Cydia and other jailbreak components. With the Safari browser hack, a web based JailbreakMe-like jailbreak tool may also be possible.
Now the only question that remains is whether anyone from the jailbreak developer community be able to take advantage of these hacks and delivery a public iOS 11 and iPhone X jailbreak or not. It has been over 1.5 months since the release of iOS 11, however we have yet to see even a hint of a jailbreak for this major operating system. With Apple constantly releasing new iOS versions and betas consistently, development of a jailbreak and its popularity have badly suffered. Company is more proactive in fixing exploits that can be used to jailbreak iOS devices.
With that said, if you are running an iOS 10 version that is jailbroken then we would not advise you to upgrade to iOS 11.1, since it could take weeks if not months for someone to even announce that they are developing a public iOS 11 jailbreak. The exploits discovered at this contest will be reported to Apple, so it is very likely that they will be fixed once iOS 11.2 is released.
[MacRumors via Reddit]
