Pierluigi Paganini September 14, 2019

A security researcher disclosed a passcode bypass just a week before Apple has planned to release the new iOS 13 operating system, on September 19.

Apple users are thrilled for the release of the iOS 13 mobile operating system planned for September 19, but a security expert could mess up the party.

The security researcher Jose Rodriguez discovered a passcode bypass issue that could be exploited by attackers to gain access to iPhones contacts and other information even on locked devices.

Below the step by step procedure to exploit the passcode bypass:

1. Reply to an incoming call with a custom message.
2. Enable the VoiceOver feature.
3. Disable the VoiceOver feature
4. Add a new contact to the custom message
5. Click on the contacts image to open options menu and select “Add to existing contact”. 
6. When the list of contacts appears, tap on the other contact to view its info.

Below the video PoC published by Rodriguez that shows how to see a device’s contact information.

Rodriguez reported the flaw to Apple on July 17th, 2019, at the time the new iOS version was still in beta. The expert disclosed the issue on September 11th and at the time Apple had still not addressed the flaw.

Experts hope that Apple will be able to fix the bug withing September 19th.

Rodriguez discovered many other passcode bypass issues in the past, in October 2018, a few hours after Apple released iOS 12.1 the iPhone bug hunter Jose Rodriguez found a new passcode bypass issue that could have been exploited to see all contacts’ private information on a locked iPhone.

A few weeks before, he discovered another passcode bypass vulnerability in Apple’s iOS version 12 that could have been exploited to access photos, contacts on a locked iPhone XS.

The researcher also disclosed a new passcode bypass flaw that could have been exploited to access photos and contacts on a locked iPhone XS.

Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – iOS 13, passcode bypass)

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