Cop tools easily bypass 4-digit passcodes

By John Leyden • Get more from this author

Posted in Enterprise Security, 10th April 2012 08:22 GMT

Analysis Forensic tools against smartphones allow basic 4-digit phone passcodes to be bypassed in minutes.

However, more complex passcodes are far more difficult to defeat and might even leave some information of seized Androids or iPhones outside the range of many tools, according to computer forensics experts.

A YouTube video – which has since been pulled – that accompanied a recent article by Forbes explained how Swedish firm Micro Systemation's XRY tool enabled law enforcement official to bypass an iPhone passcode and gain access to call records, location data, photos and other information in a matter of minutes.

The process is akin to jailbreaking and relies on exploiting vulnerabilities on the device itself, rather than entering through any backdoor. Once a device is jailbroken, the XRY utility is installed and used to brute-force a passcode. [SNIP]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/04/10 ... forensics/