Reply to post: Re: Chicken or egg predicament

Report: Aussie biz Azimuth cracked San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone, ending Apple-FBI privacy standoff

DS999 Silver badge

Re: Chicken or egg predicament

They aren't still updating iOS 9, but if once they learned what the flaw was, had they found out it was still present in iOS 12 or 14 (the versions that are currently receiving regular security updates) they damn sure would have wanted to patch it.

They make improvements in security on both a hardware and software level every year, but knowing what types of exploits are being used by the kind of companies that deal in the shady Feds/crooks market for million dollar exploits helps them decide where to target their resources into improving those defenses. You can either patch holes one by one, or close up entire classes of exploits all at once with the kind of enhancements that come from the yearly hardware/software cycles. The latter is better, but if you expend effort to close up an entire class of potential exploits that aren't actually exploitable, it is mostly wasted effort.

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