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They and others (myself included) have been selling these tools to law enforcement for nearly 10 years. Go and see how many you find available online.
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These tools are used by government law enforcement. If they have your device, chances are almost certain that they have every right to examine it and in most cases have a court order to do so.

So yes, lawful in almost every case.
What I mean by "lawful" is that this is exactly the same thing as if the police saw a safe, took it and forced their way in blindly, not knowing what's in there and using that lack of knowing as motivation. Aka not lawful at all. No just cause.
 
To hell with privacy if you use the internet.

So many don't realize this. They don't seem to see that Google Analytic is on nearly every website (including this one) which tracks their every move across the entire internet. Google knows every site they visit, how long they sit on each page, what links and buttons they click, what they download. And yet they have no problem with that.

Google analyzes every email they get in Gmail and every search they run. They've built a profile of you which they use to sell advertising to you and for other purposes.

When you backup to cloud backup, your data is somewhere that can be accessed for purposes of examination if need be. Believe that encryption can save you if you like but there are plenty of ways to get your information.
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What I mean by "lawful" is that this is exactly the same thing as if the police saw a safe, took it and forced their way in blindly, not knowing what's in there and using that lack of knowing as motivation. Aka not lawful at all. No just cause.

I've worked in computer forensics for years. I've seen the vast good it does. The situations you describe make up less than 0.1% of all cases. Instead, most of the time this type of software is being used to get data used to put a pedophile in jail so they can't hurt your kids like they have other's. It's being used to get information which stops US troops from being killed. It's used to get data which stops Americans back here in the US and others abroad, from being killed in other terroristic acts.

Your everyday cops don't have access to these type of tools. Even large departments usually don't. You generally have to go to the state level, if not the federal level, to find them.
 
iPhone = not secure. The ruse is over.
Oh, but wait! The next iPhone 7S can not be hacked. Time to upgrade everyone!

There is no device that is secure once an attacker has physical access to it. Anyone who says differently is full of it.
 
Excellent - so now they've announced this, we can expect these tools to be posted online for anyone to get hold of... shortly, I would imagine.
Hopefully, unless it's fully hardware dependent, we can expect Apple to patch the vulnerability in a couple weeks.
 
If you need to get into 167 phones a year, then that annual plan is a steal!

As for the transfer tool...
"Not included are account passwords, Wi-Fi settings, health data, and website history."
and
"the average iPhone customer with 10GB of personal data can walk out of the store with a mirror-image of their old iPhone in just 10 minutes"

= contradictory. I do not think "mirror-image" means what you think it means ("nearly mirror-image" perhaps). But hey, when it comes to marketing you can just re-define terms to suit your needs and sound better, right (re: unlimited).
 
If you need to get into 167 phones a year, then that annual plan is a steal!

As for the transfer tool...
"Not included are account passwords, Wi-Fi settings, health data, and website history."
and
"the average iPhone customer with 10GB of personal data can walk out of the store with a mirror-image of their old iPhone in just 10 minutes"

= contradictory. I do not think "mirror-image" means what you think it means ("nearly mirror-image" perhaps). But hey, when it comes to marketing you can just re-define terms to suit your needs and sound better, right (re: unlimited).

I hate buying a new iPhone at stores that want to transfer my data to the new iPhone. When I upgraded my 5c to a 5s the person at the T-Mobile store didn't understand that I had a current iCloud backup and a iTunes backup. She seemed irritated when I reset my old phone before giving it to her. (Jump program) I trust Apple with my data over just about anyone else.
 
I hate buying a new iPhone at stores that want to transfer my data to the new iPhone. When I upgraded my 5c to a 5s the person at the T-Mobile store didn't understand that I had a current iCloud backup and a iTunes backup. She seemed irritated when I reset my old phone before giving it to her. (Jump program) I trust Apple with my data over just about anyone else.

While helping a dear friend go through the upgrade process from an old cracked Android phone to a shiny new iPhone, the big box store sales rep pushed her to allow transfer of her data to the new phone at no charge using some special software. She acquiesced and let them do it. I was not there at the time (wandering around looking at aisle upon aisle of useless widgets), but upon return tried my best to not let my concerns for the creepiness of it bother me. In the end we had to hard reset the iPhone as the transfer had left residual settings issues and strange behavior.

I have since wondered if the makers of transfer software centrally collect transferred phone data for analysis and marketable data. Maybe, maybe not, but I would personally have to assume that is the case, especially given the pressure from the store rep to allow the transfer because it's a free service.
 
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I'm really split about this company, Cellebrite. On one hand, they seem to be creating useful tools, but on the other, those tools fly in the face of security and privacy. We may as well all just forget about security and privacy when companies like this sell tools that exploit it. Yah, I'm divided.
 
I still don't understand why phone manufactures don't offer the ability to set up when you scan a certain fingerprint (or better still combinations of fingerprints), it will automatically do a secure wipe (you know, where it wipes multiple times to ensure no data can be recovered). Then if law enforcement insists you unlock your phone with a fingerprint, you use that one.
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While helping a dear friend go through the upgrade process from an old cracked Android phone to a shiny new iPhone, the big box store sales rep pushed her to allow transfer of her data to the new phone at no charge using some special software. She acquiesced and let them do it. I was not there at the time (wandering around looking at aisle upon aisle of useless widgets), but upon return tried my best to not let my concerns for the creepiness of it bother me. In the end we had to hard reset the iPhone as the transfer had left residual settings issues and strange behavior.

I have since wondered if the makers of transfer software centrally collect transferred phone data for analysis and marketable data. Maybe, maybe not, but I would personally have to assume that is the case, especially given the pressure from the store rep to allow the transfer because it's a free service.
Both Apple and Android have free apps for making the switch back and forth, so as long as one of the official ones (or one from the phone manufacturer) was used, I wouldn't worry about it.
 
I've worked in computer forensics for years. I've seen the vast good it does. The situations you describe make up less than 0.1% of all cases. Instead, most of the time this type of software is being used to get data used to put a pedophile in jail so they can't hurt your kids like they have other's. It's being used to get information which stops US troops from being killed. It's used to get data which stops Americans back here in the US and others abroad, from being killed in other terroristic acts.

Your everyday cops don't have access to these type of tools. Even large departments usually don't. You generally have to go to the state level, if not the federal level, to find them.

Please cite your source and methodology for claiming "less than 0.1%" of all these cases are rotten before you throw in a "save the children" and generic terrorism bogeyman as an excuse for government overreach.
 
I used to 100% believe in the privacy of iPhone--until last September, when my 21-year-old stepson died of a fentanyl overdose from a counterfeit pill he bought. I want to be able to get into his jail broken phone but have no way of doing it--would love to know who the piece of **** was that sold him the drug. I guess now I have an option but it will set me back $1500. :(
 



Cellebrite director of forensic research Shahar Tal recently tweeted out that the company's Advanced Investigative Service can now unlock and extract the full file system for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus (via CyberScoop). To date, CAIS "supports lawful unlocking and evidence extraction" from the following iPhone generations: 4s, 5, 5c, 5s, 6, and 6 Plus. No mention has been made whether or not the developer has attempted to unlock newer-generation iPhones, including the iPhone 6s, 6s Plus, 7, or 7 Plus.


The company reportedly charges $1,500 to unlock an individual phone and $250,000 for a yearly subscription to the data extracting service. In addition to the basic system and user data it can get, the hack also targets various apps within the iPhone, including personal data stored in Uber, Facebook, Chrome, and some dating apps.

At the same time this week, Cellebrite announced the next generation of its "Content Transfer" tool, which will allow retailers and operators to fully duplicate a customer's existing iPhone onto a brand new iPhone at an average content transfer speed of 1GB per minute. The developer said this should reduce wait times in stores while also pleasing anxious customers worried about losing data when upgrading to a new iPhone generation.

Cellebrite said the most important settings get transferred in the process, including wallpaper, alarm settings, weather, photos, videos, contacts, and apps. Not included are account passwords, Wi-Fi settings, health data, and website history. The company plans to hold a demonstration of the Full Transfer service for iPhones at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, which runs next week from February 27 - March 2.
Although the developer has been most recognizably in the public eye for its relation to the Apple-FBI drama and its smartphone-cracking expertise, Cellebrite also offers a collection of services for retailers and businesses. Cellebrite Touch2 and Cellebrite Desktop power in-store smartphones and desktop computers, respectively, with software that the company claims offers flexibility by operating through a store's existing IT infrastructure to "deliver a fast, consistent service."


Earlier in February, Cellebrite found itself at the hands of a hacker when someone stole and publicly released a cache of Cellebrite's most sensitive data, including tools it uses to get into older iPhones. The hacker shared the data on Pastebin, intending to highlight the importance of the inevitability that any brute force tools aimed at bypassing encryption software "will make it out" into the public -- a prime fear of Apple CEO Tim Cook when the FBI originally demanded the company create a backdoor into the San Bernardino shooter's iPhone 5c last year.

Article Link: Cellebrite Says it Now Supports 'Lawful Unlocking' of iPhone 6 and Older Models
Criminals will just buy burner phones anyway. This is just another encroachment of the law abiding citizens security.
 
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Please cite your source and methodology for claiming "less than 0.1%" of all these cases are rotten before you throw in a "save the children" and generic terrorism bogeyman as an excuse for government overreach.
The lack of sources doesn't seem to bother anyone when people claim the government is corrupt and just want to get into everyone's phone to find the slightest issue.
 
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I used to 100% believe in the privacy of iPhone--until last September, when my 21-year-old stepson died of a fentanyl overdose from a counterfeit pill he bought. I want to be able to get into his jail broken phone but have no way of doing it--would love to know who the piece of **** was that sold him the drug. I guess now I have an option but it will set me back $1500. :(
I'm sorry for your loss, but that pos dealer is not the reason your stepson is dead. It would only fuel rage and not help you or your family 1 bit to know who it was that sold the drugs.

I have had 3 cousins die from overdoses in the last year and I blame my weak minded cousins for buying said drugs.
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The lack of sources doesn't seem to bother anyone when people claim the government is corrupt and just want to get into everyone's phone to find the slightest issue.
Lol, lack of sources that the government is corrupt, that's hilarious. Watch the news and formulate an opinion that isn't fed to you. There is plenty of evidence and sources to prove the government is indeed corrupt and want to hoard all of our data.

How do you find a needle in a haystack? Obviously, pile as much hay on the stack as you can.
 
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Please cite your source and methodology for claiming "less than 0.1%" of all these cases are rotten before you throw in a "save the children" and generic terrorism bogeyman as an excuse for government overreach.

As I said, I've got more than 10 years of working with government law enforcement across the world. I've been involved in countless cases and seen how these products are used. I've been an expert witness in cases you've likely read about in news reports and helped put very bad people away. I can say with far more authority than yourself that the abuses are incredibly few.

But keep rocking your tinfoil hat and believing that the government really cares that you spend a bunch of time browsing ******* and crying yourself to sleep. I'm sure that's super interesting information for them and stuff they'd want to risk their own jobs and freedom to exploit without a warrant.
 
Lol, lack of sources that the government is corrupt, that's hilarious. Watch the news and formulate an opinion that isn't fed to you. There is plenty of evidence and sources to prove the government is indeed corrupt and want to hoard all of our data.

How do you find a needle in a haystack? Obviously, pile as much hay on the stack as you can.
Yet, like most people when trying to speak about it, you're just asking me to do my own researchs instead of providing evidence. In a discussion, you're the one supposed to back up your claim. Your opponent shouldn't have to find evidences of what you say.
Besides, the problem isn't that the government is corrupt as a whole, but that they're using personnal datas obtained illegally against anybody without any reason. Which just doesn't happen on a frequent basis, barring a few errors here and there.
Obviously they want to hoard your data, that's the whole point of their task : collecting datas to find potential problems before they happen, because if it does happen, they're shown as terrible and incompetent. Now the point is, using these datas as they should.

Care to find me sources about what you claim and the problem at hand?
 
I'm sorry for your loss, but that pos dealer is not the reason your stepson is dead. It would only fuel rage and not help you or your family 1 bit to know who it was that sold the drugs.

I have had 3 cousins die from overdoses in the last year and I blame my weak minded cousins for buying said drugs

While I agree he should have known better about buying pills off the street--even if he thinks they are for innocuous reasons, as in his case--he was sold a drug that had the intention of death, so I look at this case as murder.

But perhaps you're right. The police don't look at it that way, I suppose, or they'd be looking at his phone. The DEA was interested, but not enough to break into his phone, and we don't have any information we could give them.
 
Yet, like most people when trying to speak about it, you're just asking me to do my own researchs instead of providing evidence. In a discussion, you're the one supposed to back up your claim. Your opponent shouldn't have to find evidences of what you say.
Besides, the problem isn't that the government is corrupt as a whole, but that they're using personnal datas obtained illegally against anybody without any reason. Which just doesn't happen on a frequent basis, barring a few errors here and there.
Obviously they want to hoard your data, that's the whole point of their task : collecting datas to find potential problems before they happen, because if it does happen, they're shown as terrible and incompetent. Now the point is, using these datas as they should.

Care to find me sources about what you claim and the problem at hand?
Talking to you about government corruption is probably similiar to talking to a slaveholder about giving African Americans basic human rights. You obviously have stake in what the government does(10 year employee) so how can anything you say be taken as anything less than propaganda?

Where is the data that supports the theory that bulk data collection leads to more arrests of actual criminals before the crime is committed? Doesn't exist.

Snowden isn't in Russia because the weather is nice, he's there because we will fry his ass for shedding light on the shady NSA as soon as we can.

What exactly are you wanting sources for? Common sense tells you that a government that locks up its citizens for non violent crimes to theirselves is corrupt with power. The tv shows you that minorities get treated like dogs by our officials. I literally don't go a day without seeing some type of human rights violation our government is doing.

And you need sources to prove any of that, correct?

And infrequent criminal activity by the government is still criminal, no matter the frequency.
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While I agree he should have known better about buying pills off the street--even if he thinks they are for innocuous reasons, as in his case--he was sold a drug that had the intention of death, so I look at this case as murder.

But perhaps you're right. The police don't look at it that way, I suppose, or they'd be looking at his phone. The DEA was interested, but not enough to break into his phone, and we don't have any information we could give them.
Again, I'm sorry for your loss. Do you have any evidence that it was intentional? You don't have to answer that here but that's an accusation that has long lasting implications if not true.
 
Again, I'm sorry for your loss. Do you have any evidence that it was intentional? You don't have to answer that here but that's an accusation that has long lasting implications if not true.

Thank you. I didn't acknowledge your consolenses in your previous post but I appreciated it.

I am struggling with my opinions because this is all new to me, but I do believe that anyone who either manufactures or sells a drug that is 50 times stronger than morphine and disguises it as sometHing that is otherwise a helpful drug should be charged with murder if that were to so happen. The state of the drugs being sold in this country is sickening to me right now.
 
Talking to you about government corruption is probably similiar to talking to a slaveholder about giving African Americans basic human rights. You obviously have stake in what the government does(10 year employee) so how can anything you say be taken as anything less than propaganda?

Where is the data that supports the theory that bulk data collection leads to more arrests of actual criminals before the crime is committed? Doesn't exist.

Snowden isn't in Russia because the weather is nice, he's there because we will fry his ass for shedding light on the shady NSA as soon as we can.

What exactly are you wanting sources for? Common sense tells you that a government that locks up its citizens for non violent crimes to theirselves is corrupt with power. The tv shows you that minorities get treated like dogs by our officials. I literally don't go a day without seeing some type of human rights violation our government is doing.

And you need sources to prove any of that, correct?

And infrequent criminal activity by the government is still criminal, no matter the frequency
What does it even mean? I don't work for the government, no idea where you got that idea. by this logic, you could be a north korean spy trying to discredit the government and nothing you say should be taken into account.

Why does data collection lead to arrests? That's pure statistic and mathematics, if you have more datas about something, you can predict or prevent something. I don't think it's hard to understand.

As for Snowden, I still wonder when stealing classified files became something people should be thanked for. It may be nothing too important or security-related, but who's saying next time, someone won't sell these informations to someone like another country?
Especially when the whole debate here is about "I refuse people collecting my datas". Why could Snowden just get eveything, leak it to the public, and not be troubled about it?
Should the government and everything related to it be public? If yes, then what of their reight to privacy? What about yours?

So you're saying non violent crimes shouldn't be punished by jail? Like, say, what the government does? Enjoy the irony. Now would you rather have someone locked up a few days because there's a reasonable possibility he's dangerous or planning something and the government must investigate it, or should he be allowed to roam free and maybe do whatever he planned to do? I'm saying that because that's exactly what happened in France, and the officials got burned for that: every terrorist attacks were perpetrated by people known to our anti terrorist teams. Do you think, if they had access to more datas, they could have guessed whatever was planned and act before it happened?
Just recently, a terrorist attack on the Eiffel Tower was prevented, from a 16 year old and her 20 year old boyfriend. Thanks to the surveillance on that guy and the girl's father raising alerts about her doing weird things, it was prevented. Do you think it could have happened if they had absolutely no way to collect data? Do you think that guy was tracked for no reason, or do you think it was because different actions on internet, credit cards movements, plane tickets etc, something lit up on their monitors showing him as someone potentially dangerous?


As for minorities, it has nothing to do with the debate at hand, although I totallyagree with you on that part.
 
They and others (myself included) have been selling these tools to law enforcement for nearly 10 years. Go and see how many you find available online.
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These tools are used by government law enforcement. If they have your device, chances are almost certain that they have every right to examine it and in most cases have a court order to do so.

So yes, lawful in almost every case.

Just because it's "lawful" doesn't make it right.
 
They and others (myself included) have been selling these tools to law enforcement for nearly 10 years. Go and see how many you find available online.
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Well I'd imagine it's easier as of a few weeks ago when this very company's tools WERE leaked online
 
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