A federal judge has ordered a public iPhone exploit taken offline after Magnet Forensics argued it wasn’t independent security research at all, but instead a stolen trade secret.
iPhone XU.S. District Judge Victoria Marie Calvert partially approved Magnet’s request for a preliminary injunction. She directed Paradigm Shift and former Magnet exploit engineer Mario Del Gaudio to delete the usbliter8 article, code, technical details, and related materials in their possession by 11:59 p.m. Eastern on July 23.
By July 23, Paradigm Shift had replaced the original article with a page indicating the blog post was unavailable. The preliminary injunction will continue throughout the litigation unless the court removes it in a separate order.
Magnet’s July 7 complaint asserts that usbliter8 originated from a confidential A12 and A13 SecureROM access capability integrated into a commercial forensic product. The company alleges Del Gaudio acquired the technique while employed by Magnet and later shared it through Paradigm Shift.