Apple is one an insular and notoriously narrow organization, a trend that has often conflicted with the security research community. Typically, the company keeps secrets about technical details about the operation of its products and security features. So the resource that researchers have relied on most in security for bread crumbs is Apple’s annual Platform Safety Guide, the new edition of which was released today. It provides the most complete and technical view of Apple’s warranties to date, including the first documentation of Apple’s new M1 chips.
Apple first offered the guide a decade ago as a very brief essay at the dawn of the iPhone era. It would later evolve into a mobile-only “Security Guide for iOS”, before expanding to include macOS in 2019. It details security features like Touch ID and Face ID, Apple’s secure enclave. and safe booting, so that software developers and security researchers can understand more about the operation and interaction of these features. Over the years, the company claims to have tried to balance the readability of a wide audience with the usefulness of those with deeper technical knowledge. This year, it includes more information than ever about new and old features.
“I am constantly referring to this guide, and it has been for years, ”says Sarah Edwards, a longtime Apple security researcher. “I use it for all aspects of my research, my daily work, my teaching job, everything. Once a year or so, I sit down with him on my iPad and read him page by page to see what I might have missed before or what happens to “click” when I review it again after learning something through my research “.
This year’s edition contains significantly expanded information on hardware such as M1, new details on secure locking, and an accounting of many software features.
Both researchers and hackers collect a lot through reverse engineering, the process of determining how something is constructed by examining the finished product. This “security through the dark” helps keep attackers at bay to a certain extent, but by publishing the Platform Security Guide, Apple can help its customers take advantage of its defensive features while providing guides for to security investigators, hoping they can find vulnerabilities before the bad guys do.
“Everything can be done in reverse engineering. That’s a lot of fun, at least for me, ”says Will Strafach, a longtime iOS researcher and creator of the Guardian Firewall app for iOS. “But having a detailed and detailed Apple authorized document is useful, as it allows people to know the intentions and limitations associated with certain security capabilities. Apple always does a great job, even if it doesn’t immerse itself too much in the weeds “.
Researchers say they always have some items on the “wish list” that they want Apple to include in future guides. Strafach wants to know more about how M1 chips safely manage the boot of other operating systems, always a question for jailbreakers when Apple launches new processors. And he’s curious about Apple’s improvements to iOS 14 that were intended to deny a ubiquitous jailbreak exploit, but in some cases can be circumvented.
Researchers have specific, even esoteric, hopes and dreams for new guides based on their specialties. Patrick Wardle, Apple’s independent security researcher, said he hoped to see more details about the antivirus and malware software’s own detection tools, the company added to today’s report. Still, expect to learn more about how to control some macOS features in a more granular way.