Apple’s Lockdown Mode is good for security — but its notifications are baffling

As a ghostly journalist I am an enthusiastic user of Apple’s Opt-in “Extreme Protection” feature, Lockdown modeThe

Apple Lockdown Mode has launched In 2022, and since then, the protection feature must be used for the dissatisfaction with corrupt countries, human rights guard and journalists in the oppressive governance system are telling the truth to power.

Lockdown Mode is designed to switch off some features on iPhone, iPad and Mac, with hackers aim to reduce the possibility of equipped with sophistication Spyware Or Zero day – Unknown flaws in systems that allow the attackers to steal and use them – Apple’s operating system can successfully break down and spy on its users.

In practice, lockdown removes some common Apple devices features such as loading fonts from the Internet that can track you, the ability to receive certain types of files, supports your position from the photos you shared, support for 2G cellular connection, and allowing people who have not contacted you before reaching the facetime and IMS. Although it is not clear that the latter is the case (more later).

In exchange for these nuisance, the lockdown mode makes it stronger to be hacked for you, even with some advanced hackers there.

There are already track records to block those advanced attacks in Lockdown mode. Says Apple It is not informed about any successful hack There are Citizen Labs against users who have enabled lockdown mode and Digital Rights Group Documents of Attack Spyware Attack Blocked by lockdown mode. I personally heard some people in the aggressive protection industry complaining about making their exploitation more difficult about lockdown mode.

However, three years after the debut, exactly how the lockdown mode works is still in ambiguity, and there is a lack of interpretation about the argument behind what the lockdown mode is taken. And, some of the notifications in Lockdown Mode are perfect confusing, improper or seemingly random, which can discourage some users from using lockdown mode perfectly.

Blocked, but why?

I say this article is to say that people who are at risk of government hackers must use lockdown mode, even considering the restrictions that come with it.

These restrictions are not problems. Notifications of Lockdown Mode have become increasingly surprised.

Case in Point: Another day, I got this lockdown mode notification (below) from anywhere, mentioned someone with the name I didn’t talk to a few months, and from whom I didn’t receive any message or call. Following this notice, when I asked that he had tried to contact me, he said that he had not done so.

Someone also told me that when they were scrolling through their contacts, one of their friends saw his name a “Lockdown Mode Block …” notification, suggesting that the lockdown mode could only be trigger by looking at someone’s contact.

But … why?

I have been getting the same notification for months that the lockdown mode has been prevented from contacting me every time I use the iMS and it is always mentioned to someone I know and who is already in my acquaintance.

These notifications are often popped up when I already message the person in the iMaceage that if I am going to stop getting their messages or worse, some of their messages have already disappeared thanks for the lockdown mode.

Hell, it probably means I’m getting hacked, or at least targeting? I should check my phone whenever I get one of these notifications?

It turns out that I can still chat with people that claim to be blocked in the lockdown mode. These people are very literally communicating with me and I’m chatting with them. Lockdown Mode is actually doing what is actually doing here?

Nothing happens when tapped on lockdown mode notifications. You have not been redirected to an Apple website that explains what or what the lockdown mode does or what these notifications do specially mean.

“I don’t think these messages are helpful. They do not include any context and are not effective, or there is no way to determine what’s going on, “Runa Sandvic, A hacker who has a startup It told journalists and other high -risk people to protect themselves, told TechCrunch. “I want to see Apple sharing more information so we know what to do with them, or not to show them at all” “

Sandvick and I just don’t want to scratch our chin when watching lockdown mode notifications every time. When I wrote about my anxiety about lockdown mode Opened Social Media, Several Man Response Publicly – and personally – they have gained the same experience and it is confused.

My editor Jack Whitaker, for example, after getting lockdown mode notifications for months “an unknown communication tried to share the control of Apple Music” as well as a notification that Lockedown Mode “Blocked Focus”, and I also get this notification while in Lockdown “).

In the lab we go

I decided to conduct a test with the help of Harlo Homes, Chief Information Security Officer and the Freedom of Digital Security Director of Press Foundation, a non -profit that helps free press. I thought that if it had made any difference – in the case of trigging confusing notifications – someone in my contact tried to reach me with the lockdown mode capable of my phone and what kind of material it would block it.

Both of us have erased each other from the list of our contacts (though we are still friends), and start chatting in the first time IMSAGE. When Holmes text me – and we both were not on each other’s contact list – I got the “Lockdown Mode Block …” Notification, now showing his phone number. I still received his message.

We have exchanged text, emojis, a cat’s picture and the icon “sticker”. All of them were dropped by the stickers, which turned into a unicode character or a nodescript file attachment of a question mark, which could not be opened even if you tap it:

When it happened, Holmes and I still could see the stickers that I still sent from our own phone, which means blocking was only visible to the recipient. It is also in the case of “Lockdown Mode Block …” notification. I got the notice, but Holmes didn’t know that I got it.

This is understandable, because Apple does not want to tip off government hackers that try to hack any of them not only work, but also warned the target person that something went wrong.

It is good to know, and again I’m happy lockdown mode blocks something and makes me safe but I still don’t know what these notifications are to say to me.

I reached Apple by asking some of their explanations, but an Apple spokesperson did not provide the record comment during the press. At least the spokesperson acknowledged to accept my message, so I know Lockedown mode didn’t block it.