Yesterday at the Black Hat security conference in Las Vegas, Google Project Zero expert Natalie Silvanovich spoke about security issues in the iMessage client. If these bugs are successfully exploited, an attacker can take control of the user's device.
At the moment, Apple has already fixed five of these vulnerabilities. At the same time, there are still a few bugs that require separate patches.
Google Project Zero expert began to search for these vulnerabilities after the sensational story about the security problems of the WhatsApp messenger. Recall that the WhatsApp vulnerability made it possible to install a spy on iPhone and Android using calls.
Silvanovic checked SMS, MMS, voicemail for these bugs - empty, nothing was found. After that, the specialist suggested that iMessage could have similar problems.
She reverse-engineered an Apple product and immediately found several vulnerabilities that a potential attacker could exploit. The reason for the holes may lie in the way iMessage works - it is a rather complex platform that includes a whole set of features and capabilities.
One of the most interesting problems Silvanovich found in the underlying logic of the application - an attacker could easily extract data from a user's text messages.
To do this, the attacker needs to send a special text message to the user, and the iMessage server will send in response certain data of the attacked victim. Such data will include the content of text messages, as well as sent and received images.
Other bugs discovered by the researcher lead to the execution of malicious code. They can also be invoked with a simple text message.
