Apple Patent Could Remotely Disable Jailbroken iPhones
After a ruling last month by the Library of Congress that jailbreaking cellphones, such as Apple's iPhone, was an exception to the DMCA, many users who didn't want to be tied to Apple's network and app restrictions rejoiced. However, that freedom could be short lived. A recently published patent application by Apple describes a system that seeks to identify "hacking, jailbreaking, unlocking, or removal of a SIM card." According to the application, Apple could combat this by remotely examining for unauthorized use. Some the measures Apple could take include:
- keylogs
- screenshots
- deleting "sensitive data" (yikes!)
- surreptitiously activating the cell phone's camera (double yikes!)
The purpose of this system is to protect consumers from "unauthorized users." It's possible that Apple will consider users of jailbroken phones "unauthorized" based on this statement from the application describing the system:
An activity that can detect an unauthorized user can be any action that may indicate the electronic device is being tampered with by being, for example, hacked, jailbroken, or unlocked.
It's unclear whether Apple will ever actually implement these measures, but the Orwellian methods of detecting unauthorized use is a little disconcerting to say the least.
