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FBI Used New Cellebrite Software To Crack Trump Shooter's Phone (bloomberg.com) 169

Posted by msmash from the ticket-closed dept.
The FBI was given access to unreleased technology to access the phone of the man identified as the shooter of former President Donald Trump, Bloomberg reported late Thursday, citing people familiar with the investigation. From the report: As the FBI struggled to gain access on Sunday morning to the phone, they appealed directly to Cellebrite, a digital intelligence company founded in Israel that supplies technology to several US federal agencies, according to the people, who requested anonymity to speak freely about the case.

FBI agents wanted to pull data from the device to help decipher his motives for the shooting at a rally in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, where Trump suffered an injured ear and a spectator was killed. Authorities have identified the deceased shooter as Thomas Matthew Crooks. The local FBI bureau in Pittsburgh held a license for Cellebrite software, which lets law enforcement identify or bypass a phone's passcode. But it didn't work with Crooks' device, according to the people, who said the deceased shooter owned a newer Samsung model that runs Android's operating system. The agents called Cellebrite's federal team, which liaises with law enforcement and government agencies, according to the people. Within hours, Cellebrite transferred to the FBI in Quantico, Virginia, additional technical support and new software that was still being developed. The details about the unsuccessful initial attempt to access the phone, and the unreleased software, haven't been previously reported.
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FBI Used New Cellebrite Software To Crack Trump Shooter's Phone More

FBI Used New Cellebrite Software To Crack Trump Shooter's Phone

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  • Twenty years old. That's in through the right time to be discovering such things about a person, I think?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by shanen ( 462549 )

      Not a bad FP. Is there anyone around here who is unwilling to stipulate that the shooter was crazy? Not sure that the exact flavor of insanity matters too much. It's always a perfect explanation, but without any explanatory power. "He did it because he was crazy, but there's no way to predict what he'll do next since he is crazy."

      However my theory is that they are looking for a pattern of motivations that combined with a pattern of innovation, perhaps combined with a pattern of crazy luck, all of which led

      • Are you referring to the recent laws passed in various states about needing ID to access porn websites? You realize California is actively working on the same fucking legislation, right? California, the bastion of GOPness, right?

        The world isn't so black and white as Democrat and Republican. Please grow up.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by shanen ( 462549 )

          NAK

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by shanen ( 462549 )

            Point of clarification: If the apparent fascist troll had asked politely, then I would have clarified what I was referring to.

            Yes, it's rude of me to label him that way, but I only have the one reply to consider and no interest or motivation to evaluate another sock puppet more carefully.

  • Kind of scary (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Papaspud ( 2562773 ) on Thursday July 18, 2024 @10:41PM (#64636493)
    An Israeli company is the one that is able to unlock everyone's phones, and they act like that is OK. I'm not...

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by geekmux ( 1040042 )

      An Israeli company is the one that is able to unlock everyone's phones, and they act like that is OK. I'm not...

      If a trees worth of American Rights violations goes down in an Israeli forest, do American citizens give a shit enough to at least put down the voting axe?

      • An Israeli company is the one that is able to unlock everyone's phones, and they act like that is OK. I'm not...

        If a trees worth of American Rights violations goes down in an Israeli forest, do American citizens give a shit enough to at least put down the voting axe?

        If the FBI had a search warrant for the shooter's phone, no one's rights were violated here.

      • So wait, who do I vote for President that will take us completely out of the Middle East? I didn't realize we had a candidate that was actually for that.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by sconeu ( 64226 )

      TBH, I'm OK with this.

      1. Better Israel than Russia or China
      2. They don't have to try another San Bernardino style lawsuit against Apple.

      • > Better Israel than Russia or China

        "At least this Yugo starts..." oooyy

      • Re:Kind of scary (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Richard_at_work ( 517087 ) on Thursday July 18, 2024 @11:34PM (#64636559)

        If Israel can do this publicly for a fee, how confident are we that foreign intelligence agencies cant do it privately?

        Also, note that Israel has sold secrets to China before.

        • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

          by cowwoc2001 ( 976892 )

          If Israel can do this publicly for a fee, how confident are we that foreign intelligence agencies cant do it privately?

          Also, note that Israel has sold secrets to China before.

          Nothing gets sold by Israel to China without the US's approval. Many weapon sales and port administration contracts have been rejected for this reason.

          Every once in a while, the US throws China a bone, but it's never anything meaningful. Besides which, there are plenty of US firms that do business in China with the US' approval.

          • Re:Kind of scary (Score:4, Informative)

            by PinkyGigglebrain ( 730753 ) on Friday July 19, 2024 @04:18AM (#64636895)

            Nothing gets sold by Israel to China without the US's approval.

            Israel may follow that rule but that doesn't mean Israelies always follow that rule.
            https://www.middleeastmonitor.... [middleeastmonitor.com]

            All you need to do is find someone with the tech you want who wants the money your willing to pay. Rules or no rules.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by bjwest ( 14070 )

            Nothing gets sold by Israel to China without the US's approval. Many weapon sales and port administration contracts have been rejected for this reason.

            Every once in a while, the US throws China a bone, but it's never anything meaningful. Besides which, there are plenty of US firms that do business in China with the US' approval.

            You think Israel can't transfer a file to China and except Bitcoin in return? They could easily do that and the U.S. would be none the wiser.

      • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

        by BardBollocks ( 1231500 )

        Except Israel kidnaps, assassinates, murders, imprisons, tortures, genocides and terrorises.

        If you're comfortable with Israel being able to hack our personal devices, you don't know what they do.

        • The CIA can probably do it as well. What's your point? My comfort level about someone able to hack a computer device doesn't even enter the equation. I'm not okay with a great many things in this world but last I checked, the world doesn't give a shit and I'm not influential enough to change that.

        • Also, way to derail this thread. Now we're going to have a 100 comments about the stupid fucking middle east and their 1000 year problems.

      • > 1. Better Israel than Russia or China ... because the genocide of the Palestinian people is so cool... So let's give Israel all the keys, what could go wrong?

    • Financed by the USA. We give Israel over ten billion a year.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      Do you also complain about your local locksmith? They also can unlock everyone's doors.

      And just like here, they require legal right to do so. Vote accordingly.

    • The way it works is CIA has all powers, but people limit FBIs powers for civil liberties reasons. CIA cant operate in USA by law, but close allies, UK, Israel, France and South Korea etc do as foreign spies without interference. CIA then taps these spies for intel about US. CIA presumably has same abilities.

  • Overarching Question (Score:5, Interesting)

    by swsuehr ( 612400 ) on Thursday July 18, 2024 @10:48PM (#64636499) Homepage
    The overarching (or underlying) question is whether Google/Android (and Apple) are aware of the vulnerabilities being exploited by Cellebrite and whether they intend to fix them.

    • If they were aware it's already on their fix list.

      If they're not then Cellebrite isn't giving them the details.

      • If they were aware it's already on their fix list.

        How do you know that? Is public knowledge for years that Cellebrite is breaking encryption on Apple devices, for any other company Apple would close the vulnerabilities in days.

        • Public knowledge is that celebrite canâ(TM)t touch iPhone 12 and newer, and cannot touch iOS 17.4.

        • Paranoid much?

          Did you read the article or summary? They can only hack older versions of iOS and older devices with their product version. For the FBI in this case, they got a cutting edge beta version no one else has seen before.

          So obviously yes Apple fixes stuff and has in the past issued many emergency quick fixes.

          Tell us you never owned an iPhone without telling us.

          What is the purpose or value to Apple to leave holes in iOS for an Israeli company to hack with full public knowledge that the devices are

    • The overarching (or underlying) question is whether Google/Android (and Apple) are aware of the vulnerabilities being exploited by Cellebrite and whether they intend to fix them.

      I wouldn't be surprised if they're exploiting hardware vulnerabilities when it comes to Samsung. Back in the day the their old CDMA phones all used the same master password which let you do things you're really not supposed to be able to, like changing the device's MEID.

    • > The overarching (or underlying) question is whether Google/Android (and Apple) are aware of the vulnerabilities being exploited by Cellebrite and whether they intend to fix them.

      Or do they have some sort of arrangement with manufacturers to leave the door for them in a direct or indirect way?

      Guess answer to that question we will never know.

    • Re:Overarching Question (Score:4, Insightful)

      by tero ( 39203 ) on Friday July 19, 2024 @02:21AM (#64636727)

      More likely Cellebrite is sitting on 0days and not disclosing. They're known to do this.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        They operate out of a rogue state. We should sanction their technology and make it illegal to import, and any evidence gathered with it should be fruit of the poison tree.

        After all, how can we know what it does to the data? How do we know it doesn't let the user add whatever they want to the suspect's phone? How can we be sure that the forensic images are accurate? It should be shot down in court, as there is no way to verify it, and they certainly won't let anyone examine the source code.

        It might also be a

    • The overarching (or underlying) question is whether Google/Android (and Apple) are aware of the vulnerabilities being exploited by Cellebrite and whether they intend to fix them.

      We literally just ran a story on how Cellebrite play a game of whackamole with bugs. That they need to release constant software updates because newer releases of the OSes cause the previous versions of their forensics software to fail.

      That said there was also a story a few years back that Cellebrite doesn't actually use all it's known vulnerabilities in the product so they have a back log of zero-day exploits waiting for a phone's new OS update.

    • Someone shared a table showing which hardware and OS combinations Cellebrite could break. Based on that, and the fact that it required the "beta" unreleased version of Cellebrite to access this phone, I'd say that they are indeed playing a constant cat and mouse game of finding and exploiting vulnerabilities after Apple patches them version by version.

      It sounds like their main strengths are in finding those vulnerabilities, and most importantly, keeping them secret.

      • There was a list with Apple software and hardware. Which isnâ(TM)t useful since the shooter used a "newer" (whatever that means) Samsung phone with Android. If there was a list of (currently) safe Samsung and android versions, Iâ(TM)d love to see that.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      The overarching (or underlying) question is whether Google/Android (and Apple) are aware of the vulnerabilities being exploited by Cellebrite and whether they intend to fix them.

      Well, if Apple/Google were aware of the flaw, they would fix them - they're not the kind to leave open a backdoor. Because if it was a backdoor, it will get exploited by someone sooner or later and they'd be forced to close it.

      This company is well known for sitting on 0 days so it has a way in, and by sitting on them, the vulnerabil

  • All you need to understand (Score:3)

    by nehumanuscrede ( 624750 ) on Thursday July 18, 2024 @11:07PM (#64636525)

    One takeaway you need to understand is the fact that no matter how much companies will tell you how secure your data is with their hardware, it's a lie.

    Another is the fact that if Company A, B or C can do it, so can Hacker X, Y and Z. ( The latter tend to end up working for the former eventually )

    The moral of this story is: Do not put anything on your phone you consider to be sensitive or important information because, as we've seen over and over again, breaking into these things appears to be trivial for those with enough motivation and know-how to do so.

    • The moral of this story is: Do not put anything on your phone you consider to be sensitive or important information because, as we've seen over and over again, breaking into these things appears to be trivial for those with enough motivation and know-how to do so.

      Considering that the shooter is dead, he's now free of worldly concerns such as whether or not the feds are able to rummage through his phone. IMHO, the real take away here is that if you get yourself into enough trouble where you legitimately have to worry about Cellebrite being used to crack your phone, you probably have much bigger problems.

      • Or, as in his case. no problems at all.

      • Police love to use their toys. Phone cracking tools are used for routine low level drug possession cases far more often than terrorism, CSAM, or murder, by a factor of 100s. It won't be long before these red states with their abortion bullshit and trans-child abusing bullshit use these phone cracking tools to enforce their persecution laws for those, with a number of others in line like rolling back Lawrence.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by necro81 ( 917438 )

        Considering that the shooter is dead, he's now free of worldly concerns such as whether or not the feds are able to rummage through his phone. IMHO, the real take away here is that if you get yourself into enough trouble where you legitimately have to worry about Cellebrite being used to crack your phone, you probably have much bigger problems.

        From Cryptonomicon:

        Randy is trying to generate [an encryption key] that is ridiculously long....trying to break a 4096-bit encryption key, it would take longer than

    • Re:All you need to understand (Score:4, Informative)

      by gnasher719 ( 869701 ) on Friday July 19, 2024 @03:55AM (#64636851)

      breaking into these things appears to be trivial for those with enough motivation and know-how to do so

      According to leaked information from Cellebrite, they can't touch an iPhone 12 or later and they can't touch an iPhone running iOS 17.4. The shooter here had a "newer" Samsung phone, where Cellebrite had a breach in development but not published yet. But nobody told us _how_ new that "newer" Samsung phone is. "Newer" might be "less than 3 years old" for all we know.

      So it's not trivial. On iOS you can make it a lot harder by not using a six digit passcode but ten digits and letters. The trick is, without that passcode the iPhone doesn't just disallow access, but it is totally incapable of reading most of the data on the device. Don't know enough about Samsung phones, but you can likely make them safer as well quite easily.

  • A lot of innuendo going on there. (Score:3)

    by Eunomion ( 8640039 ) on Thursday July 18, 2024 @11:36PM (#64636565)
    Not sure what the actual story is supposed to be. Breaking news: Cryptography is complicated and Israel is good at it.
  • "shooting at a rally in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, where Corey Comperatore was killed and the candidate suffered an injured ear"

    FTFY

    • Like you, I reversed the order. A death is more relevant than any non-debilitating injuries. This is regardless of any notable characteristics of the living that remain.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by nwaack ( 3482871 )
      My guess is the order of that sentence was determined by the target of the bullets.
  • If there is a lock on a door, there is always a way around it.

    • If there is a lock on a door, there is always a way around it.

      Cryptography doesnâ(TM)t work that way. On iOS, without the passcode, the data youâ(TM)d like to read doesnâ(TM)t exist. There is no lock to get around. If you want to break into my house, the house contents is there even if you donâ(TM)t have the key but climb through an open window. On iOS, without passcode, the data isnâ(TM)t there. No passcode is stored. No passcode hash is stored.

      Now apple has taken steps to stop you from trying lots of passcodes quickly. Thatâ(TM)s som

    • Yep. If invariant relations exist between points of data, it can be cracked. Only everything encrypted by one time pads avoids this quality.

  • Thats what probably actually happened.

    The kiosk and mdm stuff that gets checked at boot enables them to check and execute whatever, even if its not first boot.

  • Since the phone was tampered with by software from a company linked to Israeli intelligence what is the proof that anything that is read of the phone is not just data planted by Celebrite?

  • I'll tell you one person that the FBI ought to be looking for:

    The guy in the photo on either X or Facebook who was said
    to be hosing down the crime scene. He was on top of a roof
    with a thick hose squirting water onto what might have been
    where the shooter was sited.

    He was facing away from the camera and wearing an FBI jacket.

    I'll give them a bunch of (probably unnecessary) hints:

    Was he really an FBI agent?
    Was that really the roof in question?
    Are there any other shots of him?
    Can you see his face in any of the

  • “The FBI was given access to unreleased technology to access the phone”

    The FBI were given access to one of the backdoor(s)

    “Cellebrite, a digital intelligence company founded in Israel”

    Why are so many Cyber security companies run by former Mossad agents?

  • The actual truth in the background (Score:3)

    by theendlessnow ( 516149 ) * on Friday July 19, 2024 @11:57AM (#64638025)
    In the background wallpaper on the shooter's phone was a roof. A really steep roof. A really really really steep roof.

    FBI: I'm not touching this.

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