Crims zapped mobes, slabs we collared for evidence, wail cops You know that nifty remote wipe function that takes all the photos off your phone when it gets lost? Turns out criminals know about it too, and they're using it to wipe phones taken by police as evidence. The BBC has heard from a few UK forces that report some of the mobes and tablets they've taken in as evidence have been …
Well, they were insisting for this feature to reduce theft.
As a result - same as with any security feature for that matter they got something that reduces their right to violate laws and regs on unwarranted searches. This means that in democratic countries will now have to get a proper court order every time and go and dig through the provider (i/g/etc)Cloud account.
In a privatoschoolocracy, however, they will just need to call upstairs to have the RIPA request authorized by the plod boss. So there it does not change a lot.
This is conflating two separate things. As I understand it, the remote kill switch is operated by the network and the user/owner has to contact the network and convince them of their identity to ask them to kill their stolen phone. The police only have to contact the network (probably via a special contact number) and tell them to kill a phone because they don't want the owner to be able to use it.
The remote wipe is under the control of the user and intended to protect private information from prying eyes. This is done via a website, with login process, run by the company that supplied the remote wipe app. Please correct me if I got any of that wrong.
0) Install app that does an automatic wipe of the device when it next starts up if the user doesn't authorise the device's shutdown/network disconnect.
1) remove battery (or turn the device off until you can get it to the lab)
2) profit!
Next problem!
Indeed.
> "Install app that does an automatic wipe of the device when it next starts up"
I'm the FBI and/or NSA, what makes you think I need to start the phone to read its stored data?
> "you won't be able to access the info you were after when you turn it back on"
I'm the FBI and/or the NSA, what makes you think your phone encryption is unreadable to me?
> simply take the sim card out
I thought the anti-theft signal didn't care about SIM? If it does, then yeah, that'll work too.
@Ross K
I'd have thought it a more interesting read to see how he thinks the FBI/NSA reads data from a powered down device. That might just be me.
In relation to your question, "backdoors" might be the obvious (even if not necessarily factual) answer.
I don't think this is much a problem for them (most of time) since the master key is encrypted using the users screen lock password which is usually short and predictable. I also remember reading that there was a serious problem with androids PRNG seeding in previous versions which might make them vulnerable
I thought the anti-theft signal didn't care about SIM? If it does, then yeah, that'll work too.
It doesn't care about SIM, but it can't register with the mobile network without a SIM (it could do it with a different SIM card, or if it has WiFi enabled and registers with a known WiFi network.)
Crypto is not much of a hurdle against most people, because most smartphone users are security-stupid and will use 4-digit PINs or that annoying "secure" figure-point thingy instead of a really secure password. 4-digit PINs should be crackable within an hour, maybe less.
1) remove battery (or turn the device off until you can get it to the lab)
2) profit!
Next problem!
Battery removal isn't possible on a lot of phones.
You can't turn a phone off if encryption's enabled. Well, you can, but you won't be able to access the info you were after when you turn it back on.
"You can't turn a phone off if encryption's enabled. Well, you can, but you won't be able to access the info you were after when you turn it back on."
From my understanding of the tech level of most police, maybe this is what they're misinterpreting as 'wiped'?
Removing the battery / switching it off makes their job harder if its encrypted.
If the device is switched on they can try and gain access via USB debug (if its enabled), system services or the JTAG interface. If its switched off they are forced into attacking the master key.
They also seem to be unaware of the existence of professional data recovery services who claim to be able to recover data deleted from mobile devices and flash memory.
1) get (encrypted) data recovered via forensic methods
2) demand suspect provide the decryption key under RIPA Section 49
.....
Profit!
They might be able to recover data you deleted, but not if the data has been wiped. iOS has a key for the user portion of the storage that is dropped and recreated. The key can't be accessed, so it can't be copied and saved, and no data recovery company is going to be able to get it.
You might be able to find a data recovery company that will tell you they can recover from such an event, but if they charge you just for trying it is pretty obvious to see why they'd say that.
"1) get (encrypted) data recovered via forensic methods"
If you've ever had to do this, in some cases it's the same reason it's not done as why they don't put any person on the moon anymore. It's possible, but it's so bloody expensive you look for other means.
"And this complicated chain of events is something you say it happens often, or what's the point?"
If your phone was stolen, and you had remote bork capability, would you bargain on the odds the thief gets caught and your data is used as evidence to incriminate them? Really?
It's always safer to bork first, ask questions later.
There are hard drives that you can wipe remotely. And they will wipe themselves should they not be able to pick up a GSM signal after a certain length of time.
Putting one of these devices into a Faraday cage would actually cause the device to wipe itself.
> Putting one of these devices into a Faraday cage would actually cause the device to wipe itself.
So would hiking in remote locations, flight mode on very long trips etc ad nauseam.....
You only want to kill the phone manually online, really.
Lionel, why are you able to construct and articulate that but yet be unuable to grasp the difference between "of" and "have". It's as big a faux-paus as "axed" as opposed to "asked".
However "should had of" also makes no sense. Or as the other commentard stated "Should've".
I AM a grammar nazi, but I am not trolling, it's an honest question.
So, just for clarification "should of" does not exist, should not exist, will not exist.
NB "should, of course, done XYZ" is permissible.
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