HITB Throwback Thursday: An Almost Impossible evasi0n
By: Weixien Toh
Hailed as one of the then most popular jailbreaks of all time, the Evasi0n tool released in 2013 remains known as one of the most impressively meticulous exploits and shattered the then widely-shared belief that an untethered jailbreak for iOS 6.0/6.1 was practically impossible.
It was so long-awaited and highly-anticipated by iPhone and iPad users at the time that within 10 minutes of its launch in February 2013, the jailbreak clocked 100,000 downloads! In six hours, it exceeded 800,000 downloads; knocking download repositories and Cydia’s servers offline as well. Four days later, Evasi0n had been used to crack nearly seven million iOS devices worldwide - everything from the iPhone 5, 5s, iPads to the iPod Touch.
Considered as one of the most elegant jailbreaks ever, Evasi0n was the brainchild of the legendary evad3rs team which comprised the iPhone Dev Team’s much-lauded David @planetbeing Wang, baseband guru Eric @MuscleNerd, alongside Cyril @pod2g Cattiaux and Nikias @pimskeks Bassen of the Chronic Dev team who was behind earlier Absinthe and Corona jailbreaks (no relation to COVID19).
Throughout the evad3rs team’s history, they did not make many collective appearances, however, they did present a joint talk at the 2013 Hack In The Box Security Conference in Amsterdam - two months after releasing the ever famous Evasi0n jailbreak. So how did they do it? How did they achieve the seemingly impossible? Their talk may be seven years old, but still remains an awe-inspiring journey and peek behind Apple’s walled gardens. A lesson in perseverance, determination and sheer hacker will.
With that, it’s time to grab a snack, coffee or your favorite beverage, sit back and enjoy a HITB throwback to the good ol’ days of iPhone exploitation kung-fu and a look at what it takes to be a world-class jailbreaker!
Think you’ve got something equally awesome to share with the world? Submit your l33t-fu presentation proposals to the #HITBCyberWeek Call for Papers! See you in November at HITBCyberWeek Virtual Edition!
