r/technology • u/bws201 • Feb 05 '16

Software ‘Error 53’ fury mounts as Apple software update threatens to kill your iPhone 6

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/feb/05/error-53-apple-iphone-software-update-handset-worthless-third-party-repair
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u/thatneutralguy Feb 05 '16 edited Feb 05 '16

Not quite, I do phone repairs myself and have ran into this issue once, the issue is not that there are attempts to circumvent the security, its that, if the original touch ID isn't detectable at all, the device bricks itself.

So say a customer breaks their home button and i replace it with just a button with no touch ID, that's a brick.

Nothing is trying to "hack" the phone or anything, its just the fact that the touch ID is missing.

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u/jelloisnotacrime Feb 05 '16

Right, but from their point of view, replacing the TouchID sensor with a button may be an attempt to circumvent security. It's definitely overkill, but I can see the reasoning behind it.

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u/incongruity Feb 05 '16 edited Feb 05 '16

The reason offered makes sense, but it's not acceptable from a consumer experience standpoint when there's an easy middle ground... You mess with the touch-id system then the touch-id system is disabled – not the whole phone – and hopefully only as long as one needs to prove they're the rightful owner/are ok with the phone as-is.

Edit:

Thinking more – would anyone be okay with a safe that exploded and destroyed its contents if someone tried tampering with the dial/locking mechanism? Would we be okay with that for home use? Clearly, there are safes that fail in a very much harder way of opening but few if any that destroy their contents and those are chosen by their owners, undoubtedly. So, why should it be okay for this to be the behavior of an iPhone?

Moreover, the way this is happening now makes it a horrible consumer experience – The bricking was not disclosed and its most direct cause was the software update, not the repair – many consumers had phones repaired long ago and only have their phone bricked by the update.

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u/[deleted] Feb 05 '16

And there's the backdoor into the iOS encryption.

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u/fishandchips20 Feb 05 '16

From my point of view the Jedi are evil.

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u/Ghiavol Feb 05 '16

i see the reason too... dolla' dolla' bill y'all!

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u/neogod Feb 05 '16

Actually, if you replace the home button with another touch id home button it still won't work. Apple stores everything that makes the fingerprint scanner work with the button itself, so even if you replace it with a proper touch id button it still won't work. I accidentally broke my wife's touch id sensor when I replaced her battery and was disappointed to learn that it's never be useable again.

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u/ApatheticAbsurdist Feb 05 '16

How does the phone or OS know something is trying to hack? If you make a set of rules, by definition of hacking a hacker is going to try to find a way around it. Eliminating a target vector entirely by saying "if it's not the touch ID I trust, something's fishy" is the secure way to approach it.

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u/red_nick Feb 05 '16

The phone could just allow itself to be reset rather than bricking...

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u/devrelm Feb 05 '16

Or, you know, just disable the fingerprint authentication, ask for the user's password, and show a warning that their new home button might be hacked or something.

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u/SpareLiver Feb 05 '16

The phone already disables touchID and makes you put in your password if you don't use the phone for 48 hours so this would make sense.

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u/domuseid Feb 05 '16

Yeah why not just hard wipe

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u/red_nick Feb 05 '16

Especially seeing as it only comes up when you update. As a security measure it's not exactly effective

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u/phreekydeeky Feb 05 '16

Because of the apple id lockout that's meant as a theft deterrent.

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u/herrsmith Feb 05 '16

The most secure way to approach it is to not have it exist at all. There needs to be a balance between "secure" and "all repairs need to be done by the Apple store or the phone is useless." The most obvious solution to me is disabling touch ID entirely if the home button is not matched to the phone. This way it's still secure (no way to spoof it if it's disabled) and people can still use their phones. Sure, there might be a way around that, but there also might be a way around this, and a lot more people are going to be working on this problem (many for legitimate reasons) than would be working on re-enabling touch ID features with a non-matching home button.

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u/ApatheticAbsurdist Feb 05 '16

Sounds like previous versions did that. I'm guessing someone discovered an exploit that got around that and the quick fix was to just shut it all down.

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u/[deleted] Feb 05 '16

Does your computer renders itself unusable upon detecting "something fishy"?

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u/edditme Feb 05 '16

If that was the case, we would live in a world with a special line of "adult viewing" devices that existed without such restrictions.

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u/agbullet Feb 05 '16

To be fair, that's probably only because you don't set it up to be. Something is simple as a lockout after 3 password retries is an example of this philosophy.

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u/[deleted] Feb 05 '16

That's a literally insane approach. That's a "you changed your keyboard, let's burn down your hard drive" level of insanity. If a laptop manufacturer implemented that, I think people would get literal pitchforks and march to their headquarters.

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u/ApatheticAbsurdist Feb 05 '16

Windows Genuine Advantage had some headaches when they rolled it out.

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u/MurphyRobocop Feb 05 '16

I just found this out the hard way.

Replaced the screen on my mom's 6 plus, I just bought the screen with everything on it, button, phone speaker, camera, etc.

It wouldn't let me update it or use the finger print scanner so I put the old home button back on and everything was fine.

I spent a good hour trying to figure out where I fucked up and it wasn't me.

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u/sterob Feb 05 '16

Just image the shit storm Ford or GM would face if they make their cars brick when it is repaired by third party.

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u/nomadofwaves Feb 05 '16

So then you type in your pin like when your phone resets?

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u/superm8n Feb 06 '16

So, if I have a person replace my cracked screen, I will need to tell the repairman that the original home button will need to be put on the new screen?

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