It is rumored in german media, that T-Mobile is about to bar Sipgate’s application, that allows the iPhone to use Sipgate’s Voice-Over-IP (VoIP) services. T-Mobile argues Sipgate’s makes use of unfair business practices (like requiring to jailbreak in order to install Sipgate’s client) to pull customers from T-Mobile to Sipgate.
Only three days ago on friday, 11th 2008 the iPhone 3G has been launched in 21 countries. Until saturday, 12th (means on first weekend) one million 3G iPhones have been sold. Last year it took 74 days to sell that amount of iPhones. Steve Jobs will be very glad about this. Since this makes about 7 million possible customers for Apple’s App-Store…
Although we didn’t get our hands on a new iPhone 3G yet, things are as expected: the iPhone 3G uses a new bootloader for its baseband modem as confirmed by Geohot.
Bootloader versions from the “old” iPhones
As far as we are aware the there are those 3 different bootloader versions known on old iPhones:
It is widely known, that exploits for these old bootloaders have been found, that allow to SIM unlock any of these old iPhones. No matter which software revision is running.
No Unlock for iPhone 3G, but for old iPhones
For the new iPhone 3G bootloader, there is no (public) exploit known yet. Although the iPhone Dev Team states they can unlock firmware 2.0 – the unlock is most likely meant to work on “old” iPhones only. The only exploit yet known (in both old and new iPhones) is an iBoot bug. The iPhone Dev Team provided a video showing Pwnage Tool neutering the baseband for firmware 2.0:
Video: Pwnage Tool Bootneuter on firmware 2.0 (on an old iPhone)
Bootneuter 2.0 from iphonedev on Vimeo.
A new jailbreak for iPhone 3G and old iPhones
The Pwnage Tool 2.0 (and Geohot’s yiPhone) will most likely feature an iBoot bug to jailbreak old and new iPhones. iBoot is needed by iTunes to talk to when restoring firmware. About a year ago, Geohot found out that iBoot provides a full interactive shell. The only problem was, iBoot only allowed signed code to run. The iPhone Dev Team now managed to break the chain of trust from the earliest boot stage. Thus allowing to run unsigned code and in the end jailbreaking old and new iPhones (see video):
Video: Talking to iBoot unsigned
Talking to iBoot? from iphonedev on Vimeo.
Both videos are provided by iPhone Dev Team. Kudos to you guys.
Whenever you visit Berlin and you like independent Techno and Electro, we got a nice hint for you. You gotta see the Cassiopeia in the Friedrichshain district. As a matter of chance our team went to the Cassiopeia place yesterday and enjoyed accidently an event named “Reclaim the Beats“.
Reclaim the Beats
To make things shorts as possible. That were by far the most intelligent sounds we’ve heard for a long time. The guys playing the records on the floor under the roof were almost half as young as we am, but we take a bow in deepest respect. You guys definitly have shown a unique taste for sounds. Reclaim the Beats is the only adequate wording for that event. We’d recommend to simply call it DIT (Demanding intelligent Techno). Information and dates of Reclaim the Beats to be found here.
Cassiopeia
The Cassiopeia is fairly unique in Berlin. It’s got three club locations, and indoor skate park, a beer garden, probably the largest climbing tower in Berlin and many more things to discover. The price of a Caipirinha is at 5€. More information to be found here…
Update 15.07.2008: iPhone 3G allegedly unlocked using SIM Adapter (read here)
Update 15.07.2008: XPwn command line utility released by iPhone Dev Team (read here)
Update 14.07.2008: Geohot confirms that iPhone 3G got a new bootloader (read here)
It is rumored, the Pwnage Tool for firmware 2.0 (= firmware 1.2) will not be released this weekend. Enjoy youself and don’t play around until we tell you.
Anyway the iPhone Dev Team has released a video of Pwnage Tool 2.0. See here:
empty line
The iPocalypse has begun. Many iPhone 3G customers all over the world report activation issues after having bought their new gadget. The same also applies to customers of the “old” iPhone who tried to update to firmware 2.0 and needed to re-activate.
We recommend weather to upgrade nor to buy a new iPhone 3G now. Stay tuned.
incomplete Tales…
It is commonly known that Apple’s products don’t belong to the safest products in the computer industry. For quite some time now: Botnet builders are using the well known zombie technique to gain control over AppleTV to use it in botnets. This is due to AppleTV’s large market share (of about 0,5%)… Yes…
This is how these Botnet builders do it:
For several years now bad guys were sending prepared x264 movies as email-attachments. But now the time is up. Apple released a security update for AppleTV, that prevents buffer overflows. All our AppleTVs will from now on be safe from bad botnetters…
The truth behind it
Ok, you got us here. Besides from kidding: there is no need for this update. The only reason in our opinion is: they wanna stop people using AppleTV for more than the allowed things. There are no buffer overflows that we are aware that are being used by botnetters currently. Since AppleTV’s market share is so low, this wouldn’t even make any sense from an economical point of view for the botnetters.
First auctions here in Germany are already running out. As expected (read here): prices are strongly tending to 1,000€. We’re tracking this auction to see the final price – please don’t place bids. This is for entertainment and for fun only. Currently the price is at 760€ with 8hrs remaining. You could buy two 3G iPhones in Italy for that price.
Anyhow: we recommend to not buy any iPhone 3G, right now. As of yesterday (read here) the iPhone Dev Team performed to unlock the new firmware, but it is not known if this applies to the 3G version of the iPhone aswell, because it is very likely to have a new bootloader, rather than bootloader 4.6. Moreover the firmware 2.0 hack is still under heavy testing and not yet released to the public. Therefore expect scam whereever you find activated and unlocked 3G iPhones…
It has been confirmed by early buyers from Hong Kong that the iPhone 3G is not SIM locked over there. However you need to sign a 24 months agreement with the carrier Hutchison Telecommunications to get hold of the iPhone and you need to activate in store.
The California located iFixIt.com guys just got hold of one of the first 3G iPhones. In fact they went to New Zealand to get one, only to instantly disassemble it to see what’s inside of it. The whole picture series can be watched here. The most interesting thing is: the battery is not soldered anymore. Enjoy…
By the way: iFixIt.com offers a special iPhone 3G release discount of 5US$ on everything. Use this coupon code: IPHONE3GLAUNCH to order your Apple parts here.