FBI Recovers Terrorist’s Encrypted iPhone Again

The FBI has once again got hold of an encrypted iPhone belonging to a dead terrorist. It is not known which model and which version of iOS is involved. The investigative service has also not yet announced whether it will again try to force Apple’s help through a court.

The FBI spoke about the iPhone this week at a press conference, attended by Wired. At this point, the FBI is still “charting our legal and technical options” when it comes to exposing the data on the phone. The phone belonged to Dahir Adan, who injured ten people with a knife in a Minnesota mall in September. The only person killed was Adan himself, who was shot dead by a police officer. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.

In a previous case, that of San Bernadino gunman Syed Farook, the FBI wanted Apple’s help to crack the encryption on its iPhone 5c running iOS 9. They claimed that only the manufacturer could help. Apple could only do that by rewriting the firmware on the phone and building in a backdoor, which would mean that all phones running that firmware are no longer protected, since the backdoor can also be used by others. The California company refused and the FBI took them to court.

After a lengthy wrangling between the two parties, the FBI finally dropped the case. A third party had demonstrated to the FBI a method to decrypt the iPhone. That method is still secret and reportedly cost 1.34 million dollars. The hack would also not work on newer models, according to FBI Director James Comey, which would mean that it may not be used in this new case.

Last month, security researcher Sergei Skorobogatov demonstrated a relatively simple nand mirroring technique that successfully cracked an iPhone with four-digit pin protection within two days. The device, operating system and security were identical to those used in the San Bernadino case.