
The Little-Known Firm Helping the FBI Crack iPhones - adventured
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-31/inside-the-little-known-japan-firm-helping-the-fbi-crack-iphones
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jo909
Cellebrite is an Israeli company, not Japanese. They are owned by a Japanese
parent company, but I'd argue that is not the same.

Volkswagen owning 100% of Lamborghini does not make the latter a german car
manufacturer.

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madaxe_again
Yeah, I'd say that this is actually a piece intended to try to prevent any
political fallout with a close ally of the US (Israel) at the expense of the
nuclear whipping boy (Japan).

~~~
jo909
I'd say this is mainly financial news, where the ownership and stock market
representation is actually relevant. But it's a very weak piece to learn much
about Cellebrite, and makes it sound like they build pinball machines and
games before hacking iPhones.

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vinalia
It sounds like Cellebrite employees are largely ex unit 8200 members (Israel's
SIGNIT program).[1] The article really doesn't seem to talk about Cellebrite's
history much at all.

[1][http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/fbi-cracks-the-locked-
iphone-...](http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/fbi-cracks-the-locked-iphone-but-
legal-questions-remain-unanswered/#transcript) (he says unit 822 :/, doh)

~~~
dkopi
Any tech company in israel is largely ex unit 8200 members, along with other
military tech units such as Mamram, Lotem, Matzov, Ofek and more.

The Israeli military enlists every 18 year old in the country, and if you've
studied computers in high-school or at home as a hobby, you're more than
likely to spend 3-6 years in a technological unit.

~~~
ethanbond
Is 8200 really considered to be just a "technological unit?" They're one of
the most advanced military SIGINT organizations on earth, aren't they?

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BuildTheRobots
> "... built its business on pinball game machines and stumbled into the
> mobile phone security business almost by accident." (first paragraph)

Pinball? In Japan? this isn't going to be pinball.

> "has been building pinball-like game machines found in Japan’s pachinko
> parlors since the 1970s" (third paragraph).

So it isn't pinball at all, it's pachinko. I know this is almost besides the
point, but do Bloomberg really have such a low opinion of it's readers they
think it's impossible to explain? To me at least it reads like:

"Tiger Woods, who rose to fame playing a football-like game across golf
courses in America..."

~~~
spaceisballer
While pachinko is huge in Japan, pinball is also very popular. Source: My
Uncle worked for Williams pinball, and Japan is where they made most of their
money.

~~~
gr3yh47
Would love to see a non-anecdotal source on this, as my understanding is that
pinball sales in the US absolutley dwarfs totals for the rest of the world.
Not saying Williams didn't do lots of other sales in Japan, but pinball-as-in-
two-ish-flippers pinball sales should be highest in the US.

~~~
gr3yh47
source to my point:

>Yuske believes that Japan’s love of video games is part of the reason why
pinball has had trouble taking hold—why the game is more of a foreign
curiosity for most than a cultural mainstay.

[http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-silver-ball-planet-
insi...](http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-silver-ball-planet-inside-a-
japanese-pinball-arcade)

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WorkingDead
So basically the NSA/CIA develop the tech, license it to a contractor, who the
FBI can then hire. Got it. I bet they know who to use it on before they even
need to through Parallel Construction too. This is what the future looks like.

~~~
TorKlingberg
That's just speculation.

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S_A_P
Thought exercise/serious question- could the DMCA be used to compel cellbrite
to disclose the methodology to apple so that it can be patched?

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smaili
_It’s a fairly straightforward method for a researcher to identify what has
been changed, and from that reverse-engineer what the flaw was and then build
a tool to exploit that flaw_

I'd say this is a bit of an oversimplification.

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coldcode
Given Apple's almost unlimited cash they could always make companies like this
an offer no intelligent person could turn down (especially if public) and have
them explain what they do.

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venomsnake
When you mix with operative/intelligence crowd - the work is incredibly fun,
the access you have to all kinds of info (and people and gear) is
unprecedented and the generous compensation is a nice side effect.

Apple can top the compensation, but not the first two parts.

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Nrsolis
Those who know don't say, those who say don't know.

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free2rhyme214
Misleading title - it's a Japanese owned Israeli company.

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jason46
I wonder if their approach only works on iphone5 and not the 6? I thought I
read somewhere the 6 has more advanced security features?

~~~
spaceisballer
We will really only know if they release what they did. My assumption is that
it will not work with iPhone 5S and later.

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shmatt
0-day exploits changing hands for cash is hardly new. Stuxnet alone had 4
according to Symantec.

Israeli army units and companies founded by ex-army elite are highly involved
in discovering/buying 0days, iOS or anywhere else

