Here's a video of the iPhone Firmware 1.1.3, with confirmation that the leak is real from Natetrue, famed iPhone hacker. Like before, the update breaks unlocks and third-party apps, patching previous vulnerabilities at the same time. The video shows how to move icons around in the Springboard, wobbling to indicate they can be dragged and dropped around, which is kind of an Apple-meets-Nintendo touch:

We had some doubts, but now we can tell you we are sure: the new firmware 1.1.3 is real. Or as Nate puts it: "if it is a hoax, they did a buttload of work." The fact is that it installs normally and it works perfectly. For those not familiar, Natetrue is one of the most respected and veteran iPhone hackers and the author of the popular app iBrickr.

Nate goes on to say that "it installs on the phone no-questions-asked and for that you need to have Apple's private key, which i can confirm that the iphone hacker community does not have—as much as we would love to have it." Indeed, Apple's private encrypted key, used to authenticate all accesses to the iPhone most-private guts, hasn't been uncovered yet by anyone in the world.

In other words, no firmware upgrades can be installed without the knowledge of this key. Furthermore, the idea that someone would have access to this key and spend months to create a fully functional firmware update, with key new features and without any documentation whatsoever seems just absolutely silly.

Effects on unlocks and Third-party applications
The update breaks AnySim's unlocks. Logically, you can't unlock this update using AnySim and there's no alternative to iTunes for activation. If you want to activate, it will only work using iTunes and a standard AT&T account. Nate says, "that is the only way we have been able to activate so far." Nate tried to upgrade an AnySim 1.2u iPhone and it failed. Even while he was able to force it to boot, the phone refused to activate even with a normal AT&T SIM card. "I suspect it's due to the fact that the baseband could not be upgraded to the 1.1.3 'required' version", he says.

Other updates remain untested, like iPhone Sim Free or any of the hardware-based ones, like TurboSIM. In theory, these should work just fine, but jailbreak and activation would be absolutely impossible for the time being. We would have to wait until the update gets released in the open to try new alternative activation methods.

Your favorite third-party apps will be gone too, with no possibility of return for now. The update fixes the bugs which allowed "the jailbreak method we were using for 1.1.2, locking us out again, as expected."

Other effects
Like previous firmware upgrades, whatever is in the user partition remains unchanged. Only the Apple-owned part is affected by 1.1.3. So for those of you who claim that this is a fake because it says "Nate" in the network instead of "AT&T," that's the reason. He changed the network name in 1.1.2 using a program by Erica Sadun, of TUAW, called Make It Mine.

New features and future releases
The list of new features are confirmed too: all are correct, but he couldn't confirm if they are the only ones or not.

Many of you would be wondering how this could have happened, knowing the extremely tight security around the iPhone firmware updates. We don't know, but apparently the leak has occurred because "someone wanted to help the unlock effort." The source of the leak is completely anonymous, even to the people who have had access to the upgrade.

Why the update hasn't hit Torrent yet? The code could be watermarked to catch any leaks "so for now it's screenshots and videos." Also, distributing it won't make much sense at this point: according to Nate the iPhone 1.1.3 Firmware update could hit as soon as next week.

Stay tuned for more updates. [Cre.ations.net - Thanks Nate for your insight and Markus for the tip]

As we told you last Wednesday, the iPhone Dev Team have opened up the source to AnySIM, the free SIM unlock software for the iPhone that lets you use your phone on pretty much any GSM network in the world. The source being open, on the other hand, makes it a lot easier for Apple to see what kind of vulnerabilities there are in their code so they can patch it up quicker for the next firmware release. [Goole Code]

After announcing their intentions and asking the community for input, the iPhone Dev Team has announced the official release of anySIM as Open Source software under the General Public License. They also have further clarified their reasons for this move, which involve the misappropriation of code by third parties:

The move to Open Source involves both quality-assurance purposes and avoiding the people who have been ripping off their original code. According to Sam, one of the iPhone Dev Team members, "we kept the tool closed so far in the fair hope that our wish [for people to] respect our work would be accepted, but some arrogant punks had to simply continue to rip [us] off."

During the past months a number of individuals have been using iPhone Dev Team code to create their own Frankenstein versions of the software without crediting the original coders. One such case was the release of anySIM 1.1.2u, which was created patching the official version and became highly unstable as a result.

As I have been able to see myself by looking at code samples, there have been many other of these copy-and-paste behaviors from lone flat-out liars to other development groups making all kinds of claims about "their" software. For example, in the case of the Elite Dev Team "their tool is closed source and this is clearly against our expressed wish," the iPhone Dev Team points out, "in addition to using our code, they also striped out the license and changed the GUI to place their name in bold on it."

According to the iPhone Dev Team, the GPL will help the community avoid these problems. In particular, they note this part of the GPL:

* a) The work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it, and giving a relevant date. * b) The work must carry prominent notices stating that it is released under this License and any conditions added under section 7. This requirement modifies the requirement in section 4 to "keep intact all notices". * c) You must license the entire work, as a whole, under this License to anyone who comes into possession of a copy. This License will therefore apply, along with any applicable section 7 additional terms, to the whole of the work, and all its parts, regardless of how they are packaged. This License gives no permission to license the work in any other way, but it does not invalidate such permission if you have separately received it. * d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display Appropriate Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive interfaces that do not display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need not make them do so.

The iPhone Dev Team also announced that they are not planning to release anySIM 1.1.2 until they can "assure a 99% working state in a sane environment." Hopefully this move to Open Source will help the software development and testing move forward faster than before, speeding the release of new iPhone software unlocks as new version of the firmware come out. [Google Code]

The How to Install Applications on iPhone 1.1.2 Video Tutorial we published last week was only intended for iPhone owners with valid AT&T, O2, Orange or T-Mobile SIM cards. If you previously unlocked your iPhone with iPhone Sim Free, however, this was not possible... until now. Follow this tutorial to get your unlocked JesusPhone 1.1.2 to work:

WARNING: this will NOT work with AnySIM.

If you are abroad and try to follow the video tutorial to upgrade your IPSFreed iPhone to 1.1.2, you will find many problems that will render your iPhone useless after finishing it:

• The SMS screen will crash. You won't be able to send or receive short messages.
• You would be able to call, but the screen will go blank and your iPhone will crash.
• You won't be able to receive calls.

Well, fear not, because thanks to a simple iPhone tweak software you will be able to solve the problems above. Just follow these steps:

1. Launch Installer.app in your iPhone.
2. Go to "Install."
3. Scroll down to "Tweaks (1.1.2)"
4. Click on iWorld and click Install.
5. Go back to the springboard clicking on the home button and launch iWorld.
6. Select the country in which you are in and the iPhone will reboot.
7. Boom! Problems fixed.

Now you will be able to use your iPhone normally except for EDGE, which won't be activated. Apple has removed the option from the menu, so you can't write your own network and password. To do this you will have to copy modified XML files to the iPhone. Fortunately, you can also fix this.

Additional steps to activate EDGE

Although these steps are simple fo follow, if you don't feel comfortable working with the Terminal, please find someone who does:

1. Create the following plain text file called UnknownCarrier.plist on your desktop.
2. Paste the following text, changing the parts in CAPITALS for the values you need:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

AllowEDGEEditing

CarrierName
YOUR CARRIER NAME
IntlDataRoamingSwitch

ShowCallForwarded

ShowCallForwarding

ShowDialAssist

ShowTTY

SupportsNITZ

VisualVoicemailServiceName
ACDS
apns


apn
YOUR CARRIER GPRS OR EDGE NETWORK ADDRESS
password
PASSWORD
username
USERNAME


apn

password

username



voicemail_context
1

2. Save the file and close.
3. Create a new plain text file called com.apple.carrier.plist on your desktop.
4. Paste this and, like before, replace the text in CAPITALS with the correct values:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

AllowEDGEEditing

CarrierName
Carrier
IntlDataRoamingSwitch

ShowCallForwarded

ShowCallForwarding

ShowDialAssist

SupportsNITZ

VisualVoicemailServiceName
ACDS
apns

apn
YOUR CARRIER GPRS OR EDGE NETWORK ADDRESS
password
PASSWORD
username
USERNAME

apn

password

username

voicemail_context
1

5. Save and close the file.
6. Get your iPhone's IP number from its Wi-Fi network panel.
7. Get a secure FTP program to transmit files to your iPhone (like Cyberduck on the Mac.)
8. Use your IP number to get into your iPhone using the SFTP option in Cyberduck.
9. Navigate to /var/root/Library/Preferences/ and move the com.apple.carrier.plist file there.
10. When it's done, navigate to /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreTelephony.framework/Support/ and copy the UnknownCarrier.plist there.
11. Close your SFTP session and restart the iPhone.

You will find the EDGE menu available again under Settings > Network.

The iPhone Dev Team just released AnySIM 1.1, the free utility that unlocks iPhones from the not-so-sexy handcuffs of AT&T. The updated version works on firmware version 1.1.1, but doesn't fix baseband problems caused by updating an unlocked 1.0.2 phone up to 1.1.1. This means that for those people who've previously unlocked via AnySIM, you need to wait until the iPhone Revirginizer is released (which is also being worked on by the iPhone Dev Team). For everyone else who didn't unlock their phones, they're free to do so now, but be aware that you might run into the same problem when the next firmware version comes. [Hackint0sh via TUAW]