Tag Archive for: jailbreak

Hackers have discovered a loophole to ‘jailbreak’ Tesla’s paywall-blocked driving features, saving them thousands

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Tesla has been at the forefront of the electric vehicle movement. But has also pioneered another aspect of the car industry — software-defined vehicles, or SDVs — that has not been quite as universally popular.

SDVs basically mean that some Tesla features, which are already built into the cars, are locked behind a paywall, requiring customers to pay extra if they want to use them. Some features in this category include a heated steering wheel, footwell lights, an “acceleration boost,” or the brand’s $15,000 Full Self-Driving feature.

Now, a group of hackers has discovered a way to “jailbreak” those paywalled features, and it looks like Tesla can’t do anything about it.

The team of hackers from Germany — a security researcher and three Ph.D. students — figured out a way to trick Tesla’s Media Control Unit (MCU) into thinking that certain purchases had already been made.

The reason that Tesla is powerless to stop it is that the MCU operates using a computer processor made by another company, called AMD. The hack targets AMD’s technology instead of Tesla’s proprietary tech.

In order for Tesla to stop this hack from spreading, it would have to physically swap out the MCUs in its cars with a new type of processor. That said, it’s possible the practice could invalidate warranties or other software updates if ever detected by Tesla, as is often the case with mobile phone and video game hardware.

The German team of hackers will soon present their findings at the BlackHat 2023 cyber security event, where they may give more details about how they accomplished the feat, potentially allowing other tech-savvy Tesla drivers to jailbreak features on their own.

For customers who have had issues with Tesla’s SDVs in the past — the company has been forced to settle multiple lawsuits around its automatic software updates, which customers have alleged have violated their consumer rights — this news could be taken as a bit of schadenfreude.

For Tesla, though, the news is surely worrying, as getting customers to make what are essentially in-app purchases after they have already bought a car is a big part of the EV maker’s business model.

But the company also has other things…

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Tesla Hackers Find ‘Unpatchable’ Jailbreak to Unlock Paid Features for Free

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Tesla Infotainment MCU Hack Blackhat

Tesla Infotainment MCU Hack Blackhat

A security researcher along with three PhD students from Germany have reportedly found a way to exploit Tesla’s current AMD-based cars to develop what could be the world’s first persistent “Tesla Jailbreak.”

The team published a briefing ahead of their presentation at next week’s Blackhat 2023. There, they will present a working version of an attack against Tesla’s latest AMD-based media control unit (MCU). According to the researchers, the jailbreak uses an already-known hardware exploit against a component in the MCU, which ultimately enables access to critical systems that control in-car purchases—and perhaps even tricking the car into thinking these purchases are already paid for.

Tesla Infotainment MCU Hack

Tesla Infotainment MCU Hack

“Tesla has been known for their advanced and well-integrated car computers, from serving mundane entertainment purposes to fully autonomous driving capabilities,” wrote the researchers in the briefing. “More recently, Tesla has started using this well-established platform to enable in-car purchases, not only for additional connectivity features but even for analog features like faster acceleration or rear heated seats. As a result, hacking the embedded car computer could allow users to unlock these features without paying.”

Separately, the attack will allow researchers to extract a vehicle-specific cryptography key that is used to authenticate and authorize a vehicle within Tesla’s service network.

According to the researchers, the attack is unpatchable on current cars, meaning that no matter what software updates are pushed out by Tesla, attackers—or perhaps even DIY hackers in the future—can run arbitrary code on Tesla vehicles as long as they have physical access to the car. Specifically, the attack is unpatchable because it’s not an attack directly on a Tesla-made component, but rather against the embedded AMD Secure Processor (ASP) which lives inside of the MCU.

It’s unclear of the specifics of this attack, at least until next week’s talk, but researchers say that they use “low-cost, off-the-self hardware” to accomplish it. This attack is complicated, but using a previous presentation at Black Hat 2022 given in part by Niklas Jacob…

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Google PassKey Next Gen Security Eliminates 2FA & Sim Swap Scam | How To Use Feature & Sign In Now

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Hackers release jailbreak tool compatible with iOS 15 and iOS 16

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Apple has been working hard to increase the security of its operating systems and devices, and this has been proven considering that hackers had a hard time creating a jailbreak tool for iOS 15. But those who are enthusiastic about modifying iOS can now celebrate, as the palera1n team has released a jailbreak tool compatible not only with iOS 15 but also with iOS 16.

For those unfamiliar, the jailbreak process removes software restrictions on iOS devices so that the user can access and modify system files, which enables all kinds of modifications such as tweaks, themes, and sideloading of apps outside of the App Store. Apple, of course, has always stood against the process of jailbreaking its devices.

Jailbreak for iOS 15 and iOS 16

The palera1n jailbreak is based on checkm8, an exploit discovered back in 2019. The exploit is considered “unpatchable” since it was found in the bootrom of Apple’s chips from the A5 to the A11 Bionic. Of course, Apple can change other parts of the system to prevent hackers from taking advantage of this exploit, but the company can’t do anything to fix it permanently on older devices.

According to the developers behind the new jailbreak tool, it works with any version of the operating system from iOS 15.0 to iOS 16.2, which was released this week for users. It’s unclear whether the tool also works with the recently released iOS 16.3 beta.

However, it’s worth noting that the list of devices affected by the checkm8 exploit that can also run iOS 16 is not a long one. So these are the iPhone and iPad models that can be jailbroken with palera1n on iOS 16:

  • iPhone 8 and 8 Plus
  • iPhone X
  • iPad 5
  • iPad 6
  • iPad 7
  • iPad Pro (1st and 2nd gen)

The team warns that the jailbreak tool is still experimental and developer-focused. The process is still quite complex and requires a computer with Linux or Mac. Another thing to keep in mind is that only a few tweaks are compatible with iOS 16 at this…

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