jailbreak

Want to unlock your phone? Fix the DMCA

This week, a new federal mandate kicked in that makes it illegal for you to unlock a phone that you bought locked from a carrier. The rule states that unauthorized unlocking of a phone you bought -- even if you paid full price for it, minus a carrier subsidy -- is a violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Specifically, it violates a portion of the law enacted in 2000 that makes it illegal to bypass technology designed to restrict access to a certain product. And that provision has bedeviled consumers, researchers, and lawyers for 12 years -- it's … Read more

You can jailbreak iOS 6.1, but there are some catches

Released just yesterday, iOS 6.1 can be jailbroken via the program Redsn0w, but only in tethered mode and only for older iDevices.

As detailed by the Microsoft-focused tech site Redmond Pie, Redsn0w version 0.9.15b3 can jailbreak Apple's latest OS. The jailbreak requires that your device be tethered, meaning you'll have to connect it to your computer each time you restart it.

Further, the latest version of Redsn0w supports only older iDevices with an A4 chip or earlier. That means it'll work on devices like the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, and 4th-gen iPod Touch but … Read more

Windows RT jailbreak tool unleashed online

Microsoft Windows RT

Windows RT was recently hacked to allow it to run unsigned desktop apps, and now it seems anyone can run that same hack via a simple batch file.

Someone dubbed Netham45 has packaged the hack into a batch file that users can trigger on their Windows RT tablets. That hack enables people to launch unsigned desktop applications compiled for ARM-based RT devices.

The tool takes advantage of a hack revealed earlier this week by someone identified only as clrokr. In a blog, clrokr explained how he was able to change a value in the Windows RT kernel … Read more

Pirated iOS app store Installous shutters

Installous, a major portal for pirated paid apps from Apple's App Store, won't be around anymore.

Development team Hackulous today announced the closure of Installous on their official Web site. As of today, the pirated app store no longer works, and only shows these errors: "Outdated version. Installous will now terminate" or "API Error. API unavailable." … Read more

Supposed untethered jailbreak for iOS 6 ends up being fake

An unidentified hacker behind a hack called Dream Jailbreak pulled a fast one on countless iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch owners today with the announcement and heavy teasing of an untethered iOS 6 jailbreak, or software that lets users gain deep access to their device without fear of losing it all after rebooting.

In a proof-of-concept video posted earlier, the unidentified hacker connects his iPhone 5 to a computer via USB; accesses a Web site through Safari (the identity of the site is blurred in the vid); and then runs an application called Dream (coming to Windows and Mac) on his computer. After a few flashes of code, the iPhone 5 reboots with popular third-party app and code installer Cydia in place and a world of third-party software just a tap away.… Read more

Not much fun to be had with Jailbreak

Jailbreak has all the makings of a fun game: fun graphics and simple gameplay. However, a major glitch and lack of a help feature didn't leave us coming back for more.

Jailbreak opens with the Main Menu. There, you can turn the sound off and on, select the game's difficulty, and check the high score. We would have like to see some kind of a help feature to tell us how the game works, but it didn't include one. After selecting the Normal difficultly level, we tapped New Game to get started. Our little inmate appeared on … Read more

Access all your iPhone functions with JailbreakMe, a tool to unlock your phone

JailbreakMe is an app that jailbreaks (unlocks from a specific carrier) your iPhone. It allows full access to all functions built into the iPhone, as well as some apps that are not available through the App Store. JailbreakMe is itself not available through the App Store but is on many download sites including the authors' sites.

Before running JailbreakMe you should make a backup through iTunes so you can restore the iPhone to its original state should you have problems with JailbreakMe or any app installed once broken. Installing the app is as simple as running the download and then … Read more

You can replace Siri with Google's Voice Search, but there's a catch

I'll catch some flak for this, but I still like Siri.

In fact, I find it extremely useful for things like setting reminders and sending text messages hands-free. It's not perfect, but neither is it as useless as many people seem to think.

That said, Google's newly updated Voice Search is all kinds of awesome. It's blazing-fast, amazingly accurate, and in many ways just plain smarter than Siri. Use it a few times and you'll immediately start wishing you could ditch Siri for it -- or, at the very least, make it as push-button accessible.… Read more

iOS 6.0.1 already jailbroken -- for some devices

iOS 6.0.1 users can now jailbreak their devices, but there are some bumps in the road.

The latest version of the iPhone Dev Team's Redsn0w can jailbreak iOS 6.0.1 devices, Redmond Pie confirmed today after testing the update.

However, not everyone can take advantage of the effort at this point.

The jailbreak works only on iOS devices powered by an A4 chip or lower. People who own the iPhone 5, the newest iPads, or the latest iPod Touch are out of luck. The jailbreak takes advantage of the Limera1n exploit, which can't handle the … Read more