Apple has begun giving away ‘hacker friendly’ iPhones to bug hunters for its bounty program.
In last year’s Black Hat conference, Ivan Krstic, head of security for Apple mentioned that security researchers will be given iPhones that are unlike consumer models in that they can get complete access to the software. Apple hopes that this will make it easier for the bug hunters to find vulnerabilities in its iOS Security Research Device program.
Today, Apple has kept its promise and is giving research iPhones to researchers who meet the company’s requirements. The devices will have a custom iOS software and features such as root shell and SSH access. Users can run debugging tools and custom commands to try and understand the code and see what makes it work.
Apple’s bounty program has hackers finding possible security issues and bugs, which they can then report and get paid. This in turn should help iPhone developers create stronger software versus jailbreaks and nationwide breaches.
