It was all set to be the court case of the year – Apple versus the FBI and their desire to hack into a criminal’s iPhone.

Then bang, case withdrawn, and everyone was left with one burning question – just how did the FBI hack into the iPhone of San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook?

They have remained coy on that answer thus far, the Justice Department refusing the chance to comment, and even Apple are apparently left stumped. We do have a few clues to go on though, with this below from AL:

A senior law enforcement official told The Associated Press that the FBI managed to defeat an Apple security feature that threatened to delete the phone’s contents if the FBI failed to enter the correct passcode combination after 10 tries. That allowed the government to repeatedly and continuously test passcodes in what’s known as a brute-force attack until the right code is entered and the phone is unlocked.

It wasn’t clear how the FBI dealt with a related Apple security feature that introduces increasing time delays between guesses. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because this person was not authorized to discuss the technique publicly.

FBI Director James Comey has said with those features removed, the FBI could break into the phone in 26 minutes.

It is not yet known if there is anything of use on Farook’s iPhone, or whether the FBI will divulge their secret backdoor methods to Apple.

[source:al]

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