Jailbreaks are no longer outlaw, but law enforcement

Jailbreaks are no longer outlaw, but now turned law enforcement

Like a lot of IT-guys, I spent a lot of my free time in the past few weeks watching 36c3 talks.
This one sparked my interest. Its about a new kind of jailbreak called "checkra1n". This software exploits a bug at the very core of apples iDevices up to the A11 processor. This bug is part of some code thats basically burned into your iPhone with no chance of apple ever fixing it with any update.

Now from my perspective, jailbreaks are basically just for fun. You can use them to run homebrew software or pirate software (thats mean dont do that). Also, for older iDevices, they are actually one of the few ways of getting any software on there - with 32-bit devices, you wont get a functioning version of Netflix or Facebook from the Apple Appstore anymore.

Theres another perspective though: Apple devices are known for their security, even F.B.I doesnt know how to bypass their security. This means that there is a constant longing from law enforcement agencies for any way to circumvent apples strict security mechanisms.

Whats this got to do with checkra1n?

After seeing the talk, I obviously had to try the exploit myself. All it takes is to download a tool from checkra.in and run it on an Apple MacBook. You will get a window that looks like this:


What caught my eye is the mentioning of "Cellebrite".  Some time ago, i read this german vice article on Cellebrite and how its used by german law enforcement to hijack phones that are somehow involved in alleged crimes.
On their own website, Cellebrite even cellebrates (pun intended) checkra1n as a "breakthrough" for "Lawful Access".

This really has a bitter aftertaste for me. Jailbreaking kind of feels like this outlaw thing to do, where you feel smarter than the average joe and possibly even commit some petty crime by pirating that game you didnt want to pay 3,99$ for.
But instead, im basically just using software that has been endorsed by my own government through the horrendous amounts they pay to companies like Cellebrite for hardware "cracking" devices of questionable use. (after all, all you ever needed was a macbook and a USB-cable, as checkra1n proves).
And with security becoming harder and harder to bypass, we may be heading towards a future where the only ones able to break our devices free from their confined realms of usage may be goverment agents and companies that work tightly with goverments.

Theres a distinct possibility that at some point, the jailbreak will no longer be the choice of "freedom", but rather will we face the choice of whom we prefer to trust with all our personal data and digital freedom: Corporations like apple or our governments.