iPhone ‘Inactivity Reboot’ Feature Restarts Device After 72 Hours, Expert Says

iOS 18.1 rolled out to customers final month with a brand new safety characteristic that may restart a consumer’s smartphone if it’s not unlocked for 3 days, successfully securing the information on the machine from thieves, in accordance with safety specialists who examined the characteristic. A latest report revealed that iPhone models seized for forensic investigation have been rebooting on their very own, and it was later revealed that the ‘inactivity reboot’ performance was added as a part of the newest iOS replace.

How Apple’s ‘Inactivity Reboot’ Works on an iPhone

Final week, safety researcher Jiska Classen revealed that Apple had added a brand new characteristic referred to as ‘Inactivity Reboot’ that will trigger an unattended iPhone to reboot after a sure interval. The researcher has now revealed that the characteristic is activated after three days, together with an indication of the way it works.

In a video posted on X (previously Twitter), the researcher confirmed an iPhone 14 Professional mannequin working on iOS 18.1, which rebooted when it was not unlocked inside a 72-hour interval. The safety characteristic is designed to restrict unauthorised entry to a smartphone, when it’s not in lively use.

When an iPhone is rebooted, it enters a state referred to as ‘Earlier than First Unlock’ (BFU) — that is when the encryption keys used to guard consumer knowledge are safely stored on the handset’s chipset, in a safe subsystem referred to as the Secure Enclave.

It’s way more troublesome for somebody to achieve unauthorised entry to the smartphone within the BFU state, in comparison with ‘After First Unlock’ (AFU), which because the identify suggests, is when the cellphone has been unlocked, and biometric authentication (Face ID or Contact ID) is enabled.

Nonetheless, the researcher warns that three days (within the AFU state) is sufficient time for regulation enforcement to get entry to consumer knowledge, particularly when utilizing skilled instruments or specialists. Nonetheless, it would forestall thieves from gaining access to an iPhone utilizing out-of-date instruments.

Customers may allow Stolen Data Protection — a characteristic launched with iOS 17.3 — that prompts the usage of biometric authentication to alter vital settings on an iPhone. This characteristic is disabled by default, because it provides extra friction to the method of modifying some settings, however customers will reportedly be prompted to show it on when establishing their iPhone with the upcoming iOS 18.2 replace.