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Reading old text messages from iPhone on iTunes

M

maw4bc

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 11, 2009
149
0
I am not here to ask HOW it is done but if it is POSSIBLE.

Situation. My girl friend (just friend) calls me last night telling me that her new bf has some kind of way to look at all of her old deleted text messages. So my initial thought is that since she has an iPhone and is syncing it to iTunes that he is some how going through her computer and looking at them through iTunes. I would think there is a way to do that considering when you do a restore it brings all your text from that point as well.

So is that probably how he is doing it? I can't imagine there is a way to look at ANY random persons text messages without being some expert hacker.
 
iApples

iApples

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2011
1,075
0
maw4bc said:
I am not here to ask HOW it is done but if it is POSSIBLE.

Situation. My girl friend (just friend) calls me last night telling me that her new bf has some kind of way to look at all of her old deleted text messages. So my initial thought is that since she has an iPhone and is syncing it to iTunes that he is some how going through her computer and looking at them through iTunes. I would think there is a way to do that considering when you do a restore it brings all your text from that point as well.

So is that probably how he is doing it? I can't imagine there is a way to look at ANY random persons text messages without being some expert hacker.
Click to expand...


You can't look at text messages from iTunes.
 
Interstella5555

Interstella5555

macrumors 603
Jun 30, 2008
5,219
13
While texts are stored in the iPhone backup, there's no way to access them from iTunes (unless you load it onto another phone). It IS possible to get applications that will let you extract files from the backup, including text messages. Also, that's a pretty bad sign if he's doing that with his "new" GF, she should probably dump his ass before things get worse.
 
M

maw4bc

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 11, 2009
149
0
iApples said:
You can't look at text messages from iTunes.
Click to expand...

Very strange, she said he was quoting specific old text from like 3 months ago. I figured those text are stored somewhere on iTunes since it backs it up.

Anyways. thanks for the info.
 
dccorona

dccorona

macrumors 68020
Jun 12, 2008
2,033
1
maw4bc said:
I am not here to ask HOW it is done but if it is POSSIBLE.

Situation. My girl friend (just friend) calls me last night telling me that her new bf has some kind of way to look at all of her old deleted text messages. So my initial thought is that since she has an iPhone and is syncing it to iTunes that he is some how going through her computer and looking at them through iTunes. I would think there is a way to do that considering when you do a restore it brings all your text from that point as well.

So is that probably how he is doing it? I can't imagine there is a way to look at ANY random persons text messages without being some expert hacker.
Click to expand...

since they are stored in a backup file, then if she backed them up at some point before deleting them, and her boyfriend somehow figured out a way to access the right files in the backup and decode them properly, then technically it is possible, but rather difficult as none of the backup files are named in a way humans can recognize

if her phone is jailbroken, there is software that he could have installed that allowed it

so no, its not possible through iTunes, but it is possible, if however unlikley
 
M

maw4bc

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 11, 2009
149
0
Interstella5555 said:
While texts are stored in the iPhone backup, there's no way to access them from iTunes (unless you load it onto another phone). It IS possible to get applications that will let you extract files from the backup, including text messages. Also, that's a pretty bad sign if he's doing that with his "new" GF, she should probably dump his ass before things get worse.
Click to expand...

yeah that was my advice as well.

I figured there was some kind of program to get the text out of there. I mean it can't be impossible considering have the stuff people do with their iPhones (jail breaking, etc).
 
Interstella5555

Interstella5555

macrumors 603
Jun 30, 2008
5,219
13
maw4bc said:
yeah that was my advice as well.

I figured there was some kind of program to get the text out of there. I mean it can't be impossible considering have the stuff people do with their iPhones (jail breaking, etc).
Click to expand...

There definitely is, I've done it before (on my own phone/backup). Usually it will just extract all the messages to a .txt file with time stamps, so yeah, he could definitely have accessed the information... have her change her passwords at the minimum, probably encrypt the backups as well.
 
iApples

iApples

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2011
1,075
0
maw4bc said:
Very strange, she said he was quoting specific old text from like 3 months ago. I figured those text are stored somewhere on iTunes since it backs it up.

Anyways. thanks for the info.
Click to expand...

Well I know if you SSH into your device, you can copy SMS conversations from specific individuals to your desktop (The whole conversation you have had, as long as the texts were not deleted).. but then you'll need a special program to open it. I'm not sure what program that would be.

She should just break up with this guy.. He sounds like a total creeper.
 
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