Cellebrite got into Trump shooter’s Samsung device in just 40 minutes
INFOSEC IN BRIEF Unable to access the Samsung smartphone of the deceased Trump shooter for clues, the FBI turned to a familiar – if controversial – source to achieve its goal: digital forensics tools vendor Cellebrite.
Cellebrite has been used for years by law enforcement to break into locked smartphones. In this case the shooter’s device was a newer model, rendering their existing Cellebrite systems useless. Undeterred, law enforcement called Cellebrite’s support team, and the vendor quickly delivered an updated version of their software.
The unreleased software, Bloomberg reported citing people familiar with the matter, cracked the phone within 40 minutes.
Cracking of devices in this way isn’t welcomed by manufacturers, who have long opposed government and law enforcement’s desire to weaken encryption on devices. Apple famously faced off against the US Attorney General in early 2020, refusing to allow the FBI access to a mass shooter’s device because it would require Apple to develop a backdoor that would inevitably find its way into the darker corners of the internet.
“We have always maintained there is no such thing as a backdoor just for the good guys,” Apple said in 2020.
With cooperation refused by smartphone-makers, Cellebrite relies on zero-days and undiscovered vulnerabilities in devices to break through systems without vendor permission.
But according to recently-leaked internal documents from Cellebrite, Apple users might not have that much to worry about – many newer iPhones and versions of iOS remain inaccessible to the cracker’s tools.
404 Media reported it had obtained internal Cellebrite documents from April 2024 indicating that the biz was (as of April, at least) unable to access any Apple device running iOS 17.4 or later, and most devices running iOS 17.1 to 17.3.1 – with the exception of the iPhone XR and 11.
Most Android devices aside from some Google Pixel models are vulnerable, however.
It’s not clear which particular model the Trump shooter owned but, given the fact pre-release Cellebrite software could crack it, it’s safe to assume this privacy arms race is ongoing.
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