CNet (along with thousands of others) get 'rickrolled' by Dream Jailbreak
Surprise, surprise - the so called 'Dream Jailbreak' that was originally supposed to be 'released' on the 21st of December, then moved forward to today (12th) is completely and utterly fake. While certainly not the first fake jailbreak, the amount of frenzy that was generated in such a short period of time is certainly tremendous. The DreamJailbreak Twitter account had just over 20k followers prior to 'release'. What's even more of a surprise however, is that even mainstream publications like CNet fell for the 'prank' and posted a bombastically titled article claiming a 'first major jailbreak for iOS6' - Considering the number of folks who read (and somewhat 'trust' the reliaibility of CNet), one would have thought they'd at least check their facts before publishing. From the CNet article:
An unidentified hacker behind a hack called Dream Jailbreak posted video evidence this evening of something countless iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch owners greatly desire: an untethered iOS 6 jailbreak -- software that lets users gain deep access to their device without fear of losing it all after rebooting. It appears to be the first of its kind for Apple's latest iteration of the operating system and could go live as early as around 6 p.m. PT tonight.
In the proof-of-concept video, the hacker connects his iPhone 5 to a computer via USB; accesses a Web site through Safari (the identity of the site is blurred in the vid); and then runs an application called Dream (coming to Windows and Mac) on his computer. After a few flashes of code, the iPhone 5 reboots with popular third-party app and code installer Cydia in place and a world of third-party software just a tap away.
From the DreamJB.com site:
DreamJB was intended as a social experiment. In the matter of a mere week, over 20,000 people followed @DreamJailbreak on twitter.
This website had over 300,000 unique viewers. People believed in a "jailbreak" that originally provided no proof at all.
Imagine what could have happened should this have gone for sale?
The provided proof tonight was intended as a final boost to the viewers before this message was released.
Let this be a lesson to the public. PLEASE be careful when it comes to jailbreak solutions that are advertised outside of the prominent and accepted dev teams. Do some research and follow them on Twitter now.
Dismiss any claims made by anybody, unless it has been confirmed from the dev team members.
Should a real jailbreak ever surface, they'll be the first to give it the OK.
This experiment is exactly as it was named. Simply just a dream.
Thankfully the prank was nothing more than a link to a YouTube video - had it linked to an actual malicious binary, things could have been a whole lot worse. So what's the lesson for 12/12/12? The ONLY people who will be able to bring you a jailbreak would be from the iPhoneDevTeam. End of lesson.
