Apple: iPhone security holes, contacts lag, GPS quirks to be fixed soon

[AppleInsider]

A third software update for the iPhone 3G due next month will fix a broad assortment of problems and security issues that users have reported with the handset, say company spokespeople and a pair of alleged emails from chief executive Steve Jobs.

Most critically, the September update will patch a gaping security hole brought to light this week by the diligence of a MacRumors forums member. The vulnerability allows an individual to effortlessly bypass the iPhone's built-in passcode protection and then spider their way through personal information contained in contacts lists, text message histories, and emails.

A similar but less severe exploit was discovered by David Park earlier this month. He noted that the iPhone's auto-lock function could be altered repeatedly without prompting for the phone's pre-set pass code.

"Here's how the flaw is exposed," Park explained on his blog. "Let's say the owner of the iPhone sets the device to auto-lock after 1 hour of inactivity, and 30 minutes after [the] last usage a thief steals the phone. The thief can now change the iPhone auto-lock to lock after the maximum setting of 4 hours and keep doing this until he takes everything he needs off the device."

On Thursday, Reuters cited an Apple spokeswoman of saying the company is aware of the first flaw and is readying a fix. Meanwhile, Park said he forwarded his own discovery to the iPhone maker and received a reference number, assuring that the company is aware that issue as well.

Separately, Apple chief executive Steve Jobs appears to be taking a proactive role in the damage control surrounding a number of other outstanding iPhone software issues, both from his office Mac and via iPhone while on prowl.

In addition to a recently publicized email regarding an in-the-works fix for third party app crashes, Jobs allegedly fired off at least two other responses to customer complaints in recent days. The first was in response to gripes about persistent lag in the iPhone's contact list, in which the customer wittily remarked to the Apple chief that "I bet you even have the issue on your iPhone." Jobs reportedly responded by saying a "Software update coming in September" fixes the issue.

A second alleged mail from Jobs was received by a customer who fired off a litany of software-related complaints, in which he also accused the Apple co-founder of using his customers as "beta testers." Jobs reportedly responded by saying Apple is "working on a software update for September that should fix most of" the problems, which ranged from network weakness and drop calls to disappearing media items and GPS quirks.

[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]

[stukdog]

I'm really starting to wonder about all the "emails from Steve Jobs."

Are these actually being confirmed or just taken at word?

[ncee]

If these are from Steve Jobs … I'll eat my G3

[wizard69]

Title pretty much sums it up, I have confidence in Apple in that they will evolve iPhone OS to the point where it is one excellent platform. In fact that is the reason I purchased an iPhone as a smart phone rather than waiting for Android. For me the only other alternative was OpenMoko which as an idea is great but they really got the hardware wrong.

So at this point I haven't found that I need to write letters to Apple. Keeping an eye on the updates, web and supports sites is enough for now. That of course doesn't let Apple off the hook, 2.1 had damn well be ready for prime time.

As to the beta quality of the software - well I have to agree and frankly Steevo needs to be held accountable. The problem is these issues may very well be forgotten once a stable version of Mobile OS hits. By the way there is in my mind a huge difference between a product that shipped with a bug or two possible known or unknown but there is a big difference when a product ships that is buggy through out and it is obvious with in a few minutes of use. This is 3G's problem it is buggy through out and not just a little bit.

In any event I was expecting a bit of an unfinished product, what I was not expecting is what we got where everything is unstable. From Apple standpoint I don't know exactly what they can do to re-win consumer trust beyond a solid up grade.

dave

[Kasper]

Originally Posted by stukdog

I'm really starting to wonder about all the "emails from Steve Jobs."

Are these actually being confirmed or just taken at word?

To the best of our ability, yes.

Best,

K

[stukdog]

Originally Posted by Kasper

To the best of our ability, yes.

Best,

K

Alright, that's good enough for me.

In that case, I want an email from him too.

[teckstud]

Originally Posted by stukdog

I'm really starting to wonder about all the "emails from Steve Jobs."

Are these actually being confirmed or just taken at word?

Especially since he's "no longer with us".

[dm3]

The reported "bug" about lock doesn't make sense.

What do you expect it to do different is the lock time hasn't expired yet. The phone can't know its been stolen. If the 4 hours aren't up they aren't up. So what?

[leland9]

One thing I haven't seen mentioned is the how fast WiFi seems to be draining the battery. Maybe it is just me, but whenever I switch to WiFi mode, like sitting on my couch 10 feet from my TimeCapsule, the battery lasts about 15 minutes. Is this normal, or do I just have a bad 3G iPhone? Haven't seen anyone even talk about this issue in any of the AI posts.

[zenatek]

If I understand it correctly, what they are saying about the lock is that the correct way of handling it would be for a password to be entered to change the timeframe for the phone locking.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by dm3

The reported "bug" about lock doesn't make sense.

What do you expect it to do different is the lock time hasn't expired yet. The phone can't know its been stolen. If the 4 hours aren't up they aren't up. So what?

It wouldn't even matter much anyway, unless the thief is going to use it every 3 1/2 hours, how is a good sleep going to factor in?

I think auto-lock should be set to a number a lot quicker than half an hour anyway.

[ny3ranger]

Originally Posted by leland9

One thing I haven't seen mentioned is the how fast WiFi seems to be draining the battery. Maybe it is just me, but whenever I switch to WiFi mode, like sitting on my couch 10 feet from my TimeCapsule, the battery lasts about 15 minutes. Is this normal, or do I just have a bad 3G iPhone? Haven't seen anyone even talk about this issue in any of the AI posts.

Ive left wifi on all day. Something wrong with your phone. Try charging a couple of times from your wall charge adapter instead of usb to a computer if you dont do that already. Maybe your usb isnt providing enough power. That can happen as well.

[leland9]

During the day at work, I have it charging from the wall charger. At night, I plug it into my AiMac directly, no USB hub. It happens at WiFi hotspots as well. I simply have stopped using WiFi as I get 2 bars Edge in my living room which suffices. Just kind of sucks. Guess I will have to put my AppleCare to the test and see what the Genius' have to say.

[macinthe408]

On a related note, has anyone ever heard of Bill Gates/Steve Ballmer personally responding to flaws in Windows? I know they'd eventually run out of time on Earth in responding to what I am sure would be a cavalcade of submissions, but the fact that Jobs is actually doing the responding could only mean that a host of Apple employees have been axed from their respective positions, and that Jobs has assumed their roles until these iPhone issues are resolved.

[Mazda 3s]

Originally Posted by macinthe408

On a related note, has anyone ever heard of Bill Gates/Steve Ballmer personally responding to flaws in Windows? I know they'd eventually run out of time on Earth in responding to what I am sure would be a cavalcade of submissions, but the fact that Jobs is actually doing the responding could only mean that a host of Apple employees have been axed from their respective positions, and that Jobs has assumed their roles until these iPhone issues are resolved.

What does Microsoft have to do with anything? Why does every flaw brought up with regards to Apple have to be bounced off with some requisite swipe at Microsoft?

Grow up!

[DimMok]

wait emails from Steve Jobs...I knew it.....HE IS ALIVE!!!!!

Best,


DimMok

[pk22901]

I think Jobs may have seen these problems coming, but Apple needed to ship product fast.

By shipping a month later, Apple would have had more quality, but would have delayed shipping 3.6m phones. The phones would still have bugs, but fewer perhaps. Here, they shipped the phones and debugged very fast so as to not get too many people super pissed.

I think they did a damn good job with the rollout and the iPhone will earn the moniker of 'best, most secure, most reliable, most fun' mobile out there.

Eventually, we'll see Apple move to dominate all mobiles (Nokia included).

[DanaCameron]

Originally Posted by AppleInsider

Apple co-founder [accused] of using customers as "beta testers."

Has the size of the user base (tens of millions of people in dozens of markets around the world) necessitated such practices? Could Apple (or ANY company attempting such an ambitious tandem product launch as the iPhone 3G, MobileMe, iPhone 2.0 SW and the App Store all at essentially the same time) have truly tested against, and corrected for, the virtually infinite number of SW configurations existing in the wild? Could any company's R&D/QC divisions have foreseen and/or caught EVERY possible bug and glitch?

Or does it simply become more economical for such a company to QC as much as they can (i.e., do everything possible to avoid a HW recall) as they aggressively attack and capture the market (before the competition does!) and then manage damage control by utilizing users' feedback to identify problems and correct those issues with timely, responsive SW updates? Even with bad press while cleaning up the mess, would such a company still come out ahead (provided, of course, they fix things quickly)?

As an outsider to the computer industry, I'd like to hear some of your thoughts on what we seem to be witnessing?

[robmack]

I just hope that out of all these fixes the issue where the SMS notification sounds stops working gets fixed. Sure the address book lag is annoying but when I miss important text messages because the sound disables itself, that can cost me money!

[pcuser]

Originally Posted by ncee

If these are from Steve Jobs … I'll eat my G3

Don't you like your G3?

[hittrj01]

What does Microsoft have to do with anything? Why does every flaw brought up with regards to Apple have to be bounced off with some requisite swipe at Microsoft?

I may be crazy, but I believe Microsoft is one of Apple's direct competitors, so I see no problem in comparing and contrasting management styles and other forms of business practices between the two companies.

[mactoid]

Quirk? When I'm standing at my bus stop in Portland OR, my iPhone can convince itself that I'm at Memorial City Mall in Houston TX. That is SOME quirk. I'd hate to see an actual bug!!!!

[Mazda 3s]

Originally Posted by hittrj01

I may be crazy, but I believe Microsoft is one of Apple's direct competitors, so I see no problem in comparing and contrasting management styles and other forms of business practices between the two companies.

It's simply a ploy to take focus away from Apple's current problem and direct attention to someone else. How about focusing on the problem at hand instead of trying to bring in an outside party that has nothing to do with the problem?

This is a security issue regarding the iPhone -- why Microsoft should even be mentioned at all is a mystery to me

[NeilM]

Originally Posted by mactoid

Quirk? When I'm standing at my bus stop in Portland OR, my iPhone can convince itself that I'm at Memorial City Mall in Houston TX. That is SOME quirk. I'd hate to see an actual bug!!!!

You should never have bought that teleportation app until it's out of beta!

[gilles_deleuze]

Originally Posted by AppleInsider

"Here's how the flaw is exposed," Park explained on his blog. "Let's say the owner of the iPhone sets the device to auto-lock after 1 hour of inactivity, and 30 minutes after [the] last usage a thief steals the phone. The thief can now change the iPhone auto-lock to lock after the maximum setting of 4 hours and keep doing this until he takes everything he needs off the device."

Or he can just set the home button to favorites

[TheWatchfulOne]

Originally Posted by mactoid

Quirk? When I'm standing at my bus stop in Portland OR, my iPhone can convince itself that I'm at Memorial City Mall in Houston TX. That is SOME quirk. I'd hate to see an actual bug!!!!

Actually, your iPhone is working perfectly. It's your physical location that's wrong.

[onceuponamac]

Originally Posted by TheWatchfulOne

Actually, your iPhone is working perfectly. It's your physical location that's wrong.

Yeah, mactoid - have you tried clicking your heels three times and saying "there's no place like home?" then maybe you'd be in the right place along with your iphone

[TheWatchfulOne]

Originally Posted by onceuponamac

Yeah, mactoid - have you tried clicking your heels three times and saying "there's no place like home?" then maybe you'd be in the right place along with your iphone

All joking aside, there actually is an Apple Store in Memorial City Mall... (Houston is where I live and the Apple Store is usually the first thing I think about when somebody mentions Memorial City Mall.)

[NasserAE]

I really hope that Apple improve the iPhone GPS. It seems more like a software issue since my 10 year old GPS unit is more accurate and responsive to any change in location and speed. My iPhone GPS location jumps rapidly from one place to another.

[mactoid]

Originally Posted by TheWatchfulOne

All joking aside, there actually is an Apple Store in Memorial City Mall... (Houston is where I live and the Apple Store is usually the first thing I think about when somebody mentions Memorial City Mall.)

WOW..thanks! I was wondering why my iPhone was being mysteriously drawn to that location. Maybe it passed through that Apple Store on it's way to Portland, and it wants to go home!!!

[ghostface147]

Originally Posted by mactoid

Quirk? When I'm standing at my bus stop in Portland OR, my iPhone can convince itself that I'm at Memorial City Mall in Houston TX. That is SOME quirk. I'd hate to see an actual bug!!!!

Memorial City Mall? That's where I bought my phone. Ha! I even made the local evening news as someone they interviewed. But I feel your pain dude.....for the longest time my phone thought I was in Chicago.

[justflybob]

Originally Posted by mactoid

Quirk? When I'm standing at my bus stop in Portland OR, my iPhone can convince itself that I'm at Memorial City Mall in Houston TX. That is SOME quirk. I'd hate to see an actual bug!!!!

Dude, I feel for you. However, I live in the Portland 'burbs as well and I have yet to have ONE GPS error that many here have reported. And it doesn't matter if I am using 3G or WiFi. It stills knows exactly where I am.

Should I just thank me lucky stars? Or is there more to it than meets the hairy eyeball?

[steviet02]

Originally Posted by ny3ranger

Ive left wifi on all day. Something wrong with your phone. Try charging a couple of times from your wall charge adapter instead of usb to a computer if you dont do that already. Maybe your usb isnt providing enough power. That can happen as well.

Actually, I have experienced both cases that you and the OP have stated. If the wifi is enabled and connected to a network I have had your experience, but if it is always searching for a connection I have experienced the OP scenario.

[steviet02]

Originally Posted by gilles_deleuze

Or he can just set the home button to favorites

How does that stop someone from picking up a phone that is enabled and not timed out yet from changing the lock time? I don't get the solution.

[Daniel0418]

Originally Posted by leland9

One thing I haven't seen mentioned is the how fast WiFi seems to be draining the battery. Maybe it is just me, but whenever I switch to WiFi mode, like sitting on my couch 10 feet from my TimeCapsule, the battery lasts about 15 minutes. Is this normal, or do I just have a bad 3G iPhone? Haven't seen anyone even talk about this issue in any of the AI posts.

I think it might be a bad phone and I will tell you why. I am always reading these forums in my spare time and I haven not heard anything either. BUT I have noticed myself the wifi on the 3g drains the battery much faster than the wifi on the first generation phone. I think it might be in part because the wifi on/off also controls the GPS antenna on/off... I don't know for sure but thats my opinion. 15 minutes is pretty dramatic though so if its dying that fast then you definitely need to replace it.

Daniel

[hillstones]

Originally Posted by AppleInsider

A second alleged mail from Jobs was received by a customer who fired off a litany of software-related complaints, in which he also accused the Apple co-founder of using his customers as "beta testers."

[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]

Give me a break. No software program is perfect. There are bugs in every piece of software. Wahhhh, you feel like a beta tester....boo hoo! Grow up and stop whining.

I purchased and downloaded Toast 9 because it offers editing of video transferred from TiVo. Guess what? It doesn't work. The video is edited, but the original audio track remains, rendering the video useless. I am not calling the CEO of Roxio and whining about Toast 9 acting like beta software. I deal with it and wait for them to update and fix the problem.

[json]

Reading about GPS "quirks" reminds me that I still don't know how to turn the GPS off.
Maybe someone here can enlighten me?

When the iPhone 3G was introduced there was some talk about the GPS and that it was supposed to be "on" only when needed, to conserve battery. But is it really this way?

First of all there is the "location services" switch in the settings. What does this one do? It seems to me that it is this switch that controls whether or not the question about using location services comes up or not....? Maybe I am wrong?

When using the maps application the "locate me"-button seems to have been changed with iPhone SW 2.0 so that it is now a toggle switch. Tap it once, it turns blue and the location is pinpointed using a blue "jewel" on the map, the accuracy is shown using a blue semi-transparent circle and a kind of "sonar wave" is drawn to let the user know that a location function is active. Tracking is also on, so that if you move the blue jewel moves with you.

Tap the button again and it turns back to greyish-blue, but to me there is no change in the function. The blue jewel is still blue, the blue accuracy circle is still there and the "sonar waves" are still displayed. If I move around the jewel moves with me which shows that tracking is still also on.

To me it would be obvious that if I tap the locate me button to make it bluish grey, that should turn off the GPS. The blue jewel should turn greyish-blue (or some other suitable color), the accurcy circle and sonar waves should be turned off to let the user know that the jewel has changed from being a "you are here" indication to a "you were here" indication.

But obviously this is not the case.

So how do I turn off the GPS then?

[jfanning]

Originally Posted by DanaCameron

Has the size of the user base (tens of millions of people in dozens of markets around the world) necessitated such practices? Could Apple (or ANY company attempting such an ambitious tandem product launch as the iPhone 3G, MobileMe, iPhone 2.0 SW and the App Store all at essentially the same time) have truly tested against, and corrected for, the virtually infinite number of SW configurations existing in the wild? Could any company's R&D/QC divisions have foreseen and/or caught EVERY possible bug and glitch?

tens of millions of users? Are you combining all their products in one group?

Launching three products at once isn't difficult for a large company. Apple is trying to play with the big boys, and at the same time, trying to stay a small company which they can't do. They should be spending some money, and planning these things a bit better.

I wouldn't be happy if I had to download a massive firmware update like the iPhone has, every couple of weeks trying to make it a stable product, just after forking out as much money as the device costs (and will continue to cost).

[jfanning]

Originally Posted by hillstones

Give me a break. No software program is perfect. There are bugs in every piece of software. Wahhhh, you feel like a beta tester....boo hoo! Grow up and stop whining.

I purchased and downloaded Toast 9 because it offers editing of video transferred from TiVo. Guess what? It doesn't work. The video is edited, but the original audio track remains, rendering the video useless. I am not calling the CEO of Roxio and whining about Toast 9 acting like beta software. I deal with it and wait for them to update and fix the problem.

A lot of countries have consumer rights laws, if something doesn't work as advertised, back it goes, that includes software. If something doesn't work as advertised I would be complaining about it, or returning it pretty fast.

[billin]

I'm hoping the update includes video playlists, though maybe there's already a way to do this and I haven't found it yet. I put tons of TV episodes on my iPhone. In iTunes, I can create playlists that contain those video files, i.e. "Arrested Development", "Futurama", etc. This makes it easy when I want to watch a particular show. But for some reason, I can't get those playlists to appear on the iPhone - I check the playlist to sync in iTunes, but it just doesn't show up on the iPhone. So every time I want to watch a video, I have to scroll through a huge list.

Anyone have a clue about this?