Design Article
Deciphering phone and embedded security - Part 2: What really happens during an unlock operation
Mohit Arora, Sr. Systems Engineer & Security Architect, Freescale Semiconductor
7/9/2012 8:30 AM EDT
Unlock Code
Mohit Arora (mohit.arora@freescale.com) is a Sr. Systems engineer and Security Architect at Freescale Semiconductor. He is responsible for product and architecture definition for 32-bit industrial and general-purpose parts. "Embedded Security" is one of his main expertise and focus areas and he also leads the Security IP Asset team in AISG (Automotive Industrial and Solution Group). He holds more than 35 publications and is also the author of the book "The Art of Hardware Architecture." For more articles like this and others related to designing for the embedded Internet, visit Embedded Internet Designline and/or subscribe to the biweekly Embedded Internet newsletter (free registration).
As mentioned before, unlocking is the act of persuading the firmware to no longer enforce carrier-specific restriction. It's a feature of the phone's firmware, designed to allow the owner to use their phone on whatever carrier's network they want. Locking is typically done by entering a "magic" number (or so called unlock code) into the phone's user interface, in a special screen that is usually accessed through an obscure, hidden or hard to find menu.
For the majority of cases, to find a working unlock code, one needs the following information:- Brand and Model number
- Network: Network phone is locked to.
- IMEI number: Unique number given to all mobile phones.
Mohit Arora (mohit.arora@freescale.com) is a Sr. Systems engineer and Security Architect at Freescale Semiconductor. He is responsible for product and architecture definition for 32-bit industrial and general-purpose parts. "Embedded Security" is one of his main expertise and focus areas and he also leads the Security IP Asset team in AISG (Automotive Industrial and Solution Group). He holds more than 35 publications and is also the author of the book "The Art of Hardware Architecture." For more articles like this and others related to designing for the embedded Internet, visit Embedded Internet Designline and/or subscribe to the biweekly Embedded Internet newsletter (free registration).
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Jeske
7/10/2012 7:05 AM EDT
It sounds weird to me an freescale specialist, giving away hints about ways to unlock smartphones...If I was a smatphone manufacturer, I'm not sure if I would be happy reading such articles.. for sure not the ones coming from the guins wo will be probably supporting new devs...
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Steve_B
7/10/2012 9:25 AM EDT
Look at the titles of Part III and IV. It's clear that if you use the lousy "security" approaches he's describing, your products are easily cracked. Want to bet me that future parts will describe something better? Something made by Freescale? ;-)
I used to work in this area. Cellphone security is complicated, and many chip and phone manufacturers are still on the steep part of the learning curve of how to do it. Phone hackers are extremely clever, and any half-hearted "security" system is going to be hacked - count on it.
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Steve_B
7/10/2012 9:31 AM EDT
Let me clarify. By "if you use the lousy "security" approaches he's describing", I meant in part 2. Part 3 looks like he's going to describe a trusted boot sequence. Pay close attention, it's table-stakes if you want to play this game ;-).
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Mohit.arora
7/17/2012 6:31 AM EDT
Thanks Steve, you are correct. Part 3 is going to cover all sort of secure bootloader options while Part 4 is going to extend it further covering ideal security platform that leverages the concepts from mobile world and apply on embedded/Industrial devices that need best in class security.
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Mohit.arora
7/17/2012 6:29 AM EDT
The whole idea was to take Smarphone as this as example so people could relate it better to the applications they know and then apply the concepts to embedded world.
Part 3 will include more details on secure bootloaders while Part 4 will extend it to cover idea security platform inherits capabilities from the mobile world and can be incorporated in future embedded devices.
Would be happy to receive any further feedback.
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gayatrikumar_1
7/10/2012 9:12 AM EDT
Ok, now, People know the secret.
Smart Phone Manufacturers will become smarter :)
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JustinTALA
7/10/2012 10:25 AM EDT
excellent article guyz.
@author
can you propose further reading please ?
I'm super interested.
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Mohit.arora
7/17/2012 6:32 AM EDT
Justin, Thanks. Next part should be up in next 2 weeks (I hope) or earlier :-)
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jzwatches
10/18/2012 12:29 AM EDT
Well, as a smartphone user, I'm not quite sure whether this article is supposed to benefit me as a consumer or is targetting phone manufacturers. I have a friend who used to own an iPhone. He found an article online that provided a method to "unlock" it and he was able to customize his iPhone with personalized tones and wallpapers. Thus, from his point of view as a consumer, such articles have benefited him in a way that he is able to use his phone the way he wants the phone to work, and not be restricted to only the default phone features. However, if this article is about ensuring that your phone is safe enough from hackers who wish to invade your privacy, then I'm definitely looking forward to the upcoming subsequent articles to tell me how to be on my guards.
- http://www.jzandf.com
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