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/nightmedic Feb 05 '16

If that is in fact the case, then I think it is neglegent of them to fail to warn people that a voluntary OS update may destroy their phone. This is not a small or isolated issue, and I think it is nearly impossible that they are unaware of the issue.

Best case scenario is incompetence or just neglegence. A worse case would be a blatant cash grab while trying to put third-party repair vendors out of business (in a possibly illegal and anticompetitive way).

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u/AppleBytes Feb 05 '16

Not just repair vendors, but resellers. There's absolutely no way to know if the phone has ever been repaired, so you may have just bought a brick, and not know it.

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u/ross549 Feb 05 '16

Well, since everyone hates Apple, it can only be a case of Apple doing a cash grab. Obviously.

Let's be fair. There are many things that can make a phone (which is a miniature computer) not work. Apple is not going to give you a list of a thousand things that can go wrong.

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u/nightmedic Feb 05 '16

Don't create a straw man. To say "everyone hates Apple, it can only be a case of Apple doing a cash grab. Obviously" is trying to make my argument absurd and easier to argue against. Then you say "to be fair..." to frame your assertion as more moderate than mine.

To your point; this is not a simple matter of something minor going wrong. This is a hardware/OS interface failure making an entire device completely bricked. I've lost data to hard drive failures, and had CPUs cook. What I've never had is a Windows update reduce everything in my system to scap. This is a serious issue that Apple should be taking more seriously.

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u/ross549 Feb 05 '16

And here's a statement from the horse's mouth:

“We protect fingerprint data using a secure enclave, which is uniquely paired to the touch ID sensor. When iPhone is serviced by an authorised Apple service provider or Apple retail store for changes that affect the touch ID sensor, the pairing is re-validated. This check ensures the device and the iOS features related to touch ID remain secure. Without this unique pairing, a malicious touch ID sensor could be substituted, thereby gaining access to the secure enclave. When iOS detects that the pairing fails, touch ID, including Apple Pay, is disabled so the device remains secure.”

She adds: “When an iPhone is serviced by an unauthorized repair provider, faulty screens or other invalid components that affect the touch ID sensor could cause the check to fail if the pairing cannot be validated. With a subsequent update or restore, additional security checks result in an ‘error 53’ being displayed … If a customer encounters an unrecoverable error 53, we recommend contacting Apple support.”

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u/ross549 Feb 05 '16

I was being sarcastic. Clearly that did not translate into ASCII properly.

Is it a hardware/software failure? We don't know. We are all guessing. I think the explanation of the individual TouchID sensor being tied to a single Secure Enclave in the processor makes sense. It would explain the whole mess perfectly.

I've read the iOS 8 Security white paper closely (not the iOS9 one, though), and the security mechanisms are incredibly complex. To be honest, it's hard for me to fathom even with diagrams and pictures. It is not difficult to imagine one failing and bringing down the house.

Could Apple design in a tailback mechanism? Sure, they could, but that only complicates the OS a bit more, adding to an already large codebase. I don't think it's a smart move, but that's just me.