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iPhone: Vulnerability to fire damage?

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(@podile)
Posts: 4
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Hello –

I've seen forensics and data recovery services advertise the ability to recover data from fire damaged iPhones. Except for perhaps minor cases, this seems hard to believe 😯 – like a 'chip-off' acquisition in the extreme.

> Just how resilient would a flash memory chip (and its data) be if exposed to substantial fire?
> On something even like an iPhone 3GS (with hardware encryption of the full disk), wouldn't substantial damage to just the logic board thus make the chip forever unreadable (since keys from both are required, no?)
> Are these merely cases of an iPhone caught in a fire, but not getting the brunt of the flame (i.e., luck?)

Maybe these services are talking more about non-iPhone mobiles (without full disk encryption?) Curious about what your experience with this is.

 
Posted : 27/08/2015 6:41 am
SamBrown
(@sambrown)
Posts: 97
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It depends on how severe the damage actually is. If the mainboard is still intact you can just remove it and put it in another iPhone "body".
If the mainboard is damaged it gets way more complicated. I don't know if it is possible to recover any data in this case, especially since the iPhone uses a full disk encryption which should make a chip off approach impossible.

 
Posted : 27/08/2015 11:32 am
(@podile)
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iPhone uses a full disk encryption which should make a chip off approach impossible.

In terms of hardware full disk encryption, is the 3GS as impossible to 'chip off' as the newer iPhones (assuming the logic board has been irreparably destroyed)?

 
Posted : 30/08/2015 12:41 am
(@einstein9)
Posts: 50
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Iphone encryption requires the KEY to decrypt the Mem. chip
which is divided into pieces not saved on a single place.

 
Posted : 31/08/2015 9:21 pm
(@podile)
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Iphone encryption requires the KEY to decrypt the Mem. chip
which is divided into pieces not saved on a single place.

So a chip-off analysis of the flash memory chip with encrypted data is not a feasible option then…right?

 
Posted : 01/09/2015 3:47 am
(@einstein9)
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Yes,

 
Posted : 01/09/2015 6:12 pm
(@randomaccess)
Posts: 385
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I dont think that's quite right. I thought Iphones only started encrypting from iphone4 so you might be ok to do a chip off of a 3gs and recover stuff; depends on the iOS version as well.

Im not 100% sure so I'd do a bit of reading but you might be able to Zdzarski's paper's floating around, as well as the sogetti research http//esec-lab.sogeti.com/static/publications/11-hitbamsterdam-iphonedataprotection.pdf

 
Posted : 02/09/2015 5:13 am
(@podile)
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3GS has full data encryption of the disk (hardware cryptochip) … iOS 4 adds data encryption as well.

Back to original topic How resistant would something like a flash memory chip be to a severe fire environment? (i.e., claims of recovering them from "fire damage")

 
Posted : 02/09/2015 8:17 am
(@einstein9)
Posts: 50
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I dont think that's quite right. I thought Iphones only started encrypting from iphone4 so you might be ok to do a chip off of a 3gs and recover stuff; depends on the iOS version as well.

Im not 100% sure so I'd do a bit of reading but you might be able to Zdzarski's paper's floating around, as well as the sogetti research http//esec-lab.sogeti.com/static/publications/11-hitbamsterdam-iphonedataprotection.pdf

you can try to remove for example here the MEM chip from Iphone4S and fix it inside a working Iphone5 will never work.
and in order to decrypt any Data you will need a KEY which is on this case not stored inside a Single chip but spreaded in many places and too difficult to know and say where is it.

hope this helps here

 
Posted : 03/09/2015 2:11 pm
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