Pin code cracking

My daughter lost her [my old] iphone XR in the early hours of yesterday, somewhere on the university campus. It was locked with a 6 digit pin code but was used to access the internet in the hours following. Is pin code cracking really that simple, or has the phone been quickly passed to a professional sleaze?

Kicking myself as I was just walking into a funeral yesterday afternoon when I found out, and what with one thing or another, it was forgotten about until first this morning.

The FBI would suggest that cracking a pin protected iPhone is pretty difficult - even with just a 4 digit pin, with a 6 digit it could take centuries or longer to get in.

The FBI use very specific hardware to crack iPhones that is not available to many people.

I don't know how someone has got in to use it but it probably wasn't by cracking the pin code. Does the phone have "find my iphone" installed - if so it should be possible to track it?

The XR security also shuts down the USB port after a period of time or a number of failed attempts to log in. Assuming Face ID was turned on then this is also pretty hard to crack.

Thinking further - how do you know it has accessed the Internet? Could it just be background services like mail checking in and other "system services" that have used data rather than someone having cracked the phone?

If you don't mind erasing the data on the phone, it's fairly simple to bypass the pin code. I'd rather not post links as to how this is done, but a little Googling will reveal them.

So your private data is safe, but the iPhone itself isn't.

If "find my phone" is turned on then I believe it is incredibly difficult to wipe the phone and make it usable again because you have to have the iCloud password to be able to reinstall the OS to a usable state.

It is also possible (and more likely) the person just removed the SIM and put it in another phone if a SIM PIN wasn't setup - that way they can make calls and use data just not in the iPhone it came from.

Well, I guess there's no harm in posting this links since it's from Apple themselves: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT204306

Simples!

That is well known.

But, the more recent iPhones will disable the USB port if the wrong PIN is entered a number of times - once disabled it can only be reenabled by entering the PIN correctly.

If find my iphone is enabled then even once you have restored the device you cannot use it unless you have the icloud password - the device just will not let you in until the correct password is entered.

All of this depends on what options were setup on the device and what state the device was in when the "finder" tried to use it. There has been a very recent case where the FBI were trying to force Apple to unlock a device - the security setup on the device makes it nearly impossible to do and there is currently on one known way of doing so and that is not available to many people (and the FBI don't give much info on what that method is). Apple are constantly closing these loopholes in devices so cracking a properly secured device is very very difficult.

I still put money that the SIM card was taken out of the phone and put in to another device to be used. This can also be avoided by setting a PIN on the SIM itself which I would recommend everyone does so that the SIM cannot be used if the device is stolen.

The iPhone that the OP refers to doesn't appear to be a newer one.

The FBI's problems are irrelevant here. They were trying to access the data on the iPhone. I've already said that bypassing the pin erases the data, so these methods were useless for their purposes.

TBH, if my phone was stolen then the SIM would be the least of my worries.

The XR is not an old phone (it was released in October 2018) - it has all of the security capabilities of the current iPhones.

As I have said a number of times if "find my iphone" is turned on (which it is by default these days) then you cannot use an iPhone without knowing either the pin code or the icloud password - resetting the device in the manner you linked will not get you in to a phone without the password. Please trust me on this - we have a number of iPhones that have been essentially bricked because the user when returning them didn't turn off find my iphone and we don't have access to their icloud account - Apple will not unlock the phone for us and so they cannot be used - even on fairly old versions of iOS and older devices this is the case.

EDIT : And as far as the SIM goes a large amount of call costs can be run up pretty quickly with a stolen SIM - and you may be liable for them right up to the point you inform the mobile company that it has been stolen.

Edited by ian72 (Fri 24-Jan-20 12:15:52)

I would imagine that if "find my iPhone" was enabled the OP would be able to locate the iPhone.