Researchers Break Apple’s Encryption

Researchers at Johns Hopkins University (JHU), led by Matthew D. Green, have found a bug in Apple’s encryption. It can allow a skilled attacker to decrypt secure photos and videos sent as message. The flaw might not have been used by the FBI🔎 to recover information on the San Bernardino terrorist’s iPhone, but it proves that encryption isn’t fool proof. Green is a cryptographer and said that a court compelling Apple to undo its own security makes no sense as there are already bugs which can be exploited. He said, “Even Apple, with all their skills — and they have terrific cryptographers — wasn’t able to quite get this right.” Green’s team of graduate students will publish a paper describing the bug as soon as Apple issues a patch for it. Green said that it’s frightening that “we’re having this conversation about adding back doors to encryption when we can’t even get basic encryption right.”