Geohot ra1ns on Apple parade with new iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch jailbreak

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Sunday, 10 October 2010 14:01

Your IT - Mobility

Original iPhone hardware hacker, George Hotz or 'Geohot', has beaten the iPhone Dev Team to an iOS 4.1 jailbreak called Limera1n, giving users to wish to jailbreak their iPad (on iOS 3.2.2), iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPod Touch 4th Gen or the iPod Touch 3rd Gen that ability again, after iOS 4.1 initially took it away, with Geohot promising the jailbreak should work with the upcoming iOS 4.2 and future iOS releases.

UPDATED: The jailbreak game of cat and mouse that Apple and hardware hackers have been playing since the original iPhone was first released has seen the latest salvo finally erupt and explode into a million glittery jailbroken pieces.

Update: new version available with fixes, see page 3 for details.

Apple's iDevices, which include the iOS-running iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, were all recently jailbreakable on their previous iOS versions, but once Apple updated to iOS 3.2.2 on the iPad, and iOS 4.1 for the iPhone and iPod Touch, the 'jailbreakme.com' online and instant jailbreak solution ceased working, as Apple plugged the hole in its PDF reader which enabled the exploit.

So, those who wish to delve more deeply into Apple's hi-tech iTech have either been forced to stay on their previous iOS versions, or wait until the iPhone hackers once again find a way through Apple's defences.

Although the ChronicDevTeam, a competing iPhone hacking group to the iPhoneDevTeam and Geohot had announced that it was set to release its 'GreenPo1son' jailbreak for the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, at 10.10am on the date 10/10/10, the initial release wasn't going to work with the iPhone 3GS or the iPod Touch 3rd Gen as it used a different exploit to that Geohot was using.

So Geohot then came out and said he'd release his Limera1n jailbreak on 10/11/10, a day after the ChronicDevTeam's jailbreak, but instead Geohot has released his exploit a day earlier on 10/9/10, with these dates being in US style with the first 10 being the month, the second number the day, and of course the last number being the year 2010.

Reports say ChronicDev knew about the exploit Geohot has used but wanted to effectively keep it up their sleeves and have it in reserve to use for a future iOS jailbreak, and to prevent Apple from discovering it and prematurely fixing it.

As you'd expect, reports say the ChronicDevTeam isn't impressed with Geohot, but a feud between the all jailbreakers has simmering since basically the beginning, so tit-for-tat rivalries over whose jailbreak is better and who was able to release it first are to be expected, with Geohot striking a day earlier where it is still 10/9/10, instead of 10/10/10 as it is here now in Australia as I type. 

Reports also say that ChronicDev has been forced to update its jailbreak to additionally feature the exploit Geohot has used, or to simply use Geohot's exploit and to save Chronic's exploit for another time, and given that the Chronic's jailbreak is yet to launch (at time of publication), they're probably hard at work trying to figure out which path to take.You can also see at Chronic's Twitter feed that they aren't happy with Geohot!

However, Geohot is the one who is getting all the current jailbreak publicity because he has indeed launched first with a tool for Windows users, with jailbreak software that runs on Mac and Linux systems to come.

What Geohot says about the jailbreak and its development is on page two, as is a link to the Limera1n site, please read on!