Apple has decided to block jailbroken phones from accessing iBooks content. Apple Insider reports that those attempting to access iBooks content on their jailbroken devices get the following message:
“There is a problem with the configuration of your iPhone,” the error message in iBooks 1.2.1 reads. “Please restore with iTunes and reinstall iBooks.”
It seemed all was calm on the iOS Jailbreaker front, but it looks like Apple is not done. It’s been about a week since the latest iOS 4.2.1 Jailbreak, greenpois0n, was released. Pretty much any time an iOS version is released, the jailbreak follows soon after. This seems like an interesting way to control the problem.
Hacker “Comex” of the iPhone Dev Team explained via Twitter how the new anti-jailbreak measure works: “It seems that before opening a DRMed book, iBooks drops an improperly signed binary, tries to execute it, and if it works concludes that the device is jailbroken and refuses to open the book.”
It will be interesting to see if this is just a method for Apple to control pirating of iBooks or if this is just the first move in a larger battle. This would prevent pirating content, but the security measure even blocks legally-purchased content.
What happens when they add a similar “feature” to other standard applications?
via AppleInsider