iOS 6 Untethered Jailbreak Release Date Buzz: Are Hackers Waiting For iOS 6.1?

By Kukil Bora | January 24 2013 6:42 AM

Over the last few months, there has been a lot of fuss in the iOS jailbreak community over the release of the long awaited iOS 6 untethered jailbreak. From fake jailbreak websites to temporary back out of prominent hackers, a lot of things took place creating much drone around the tech world. Many people even got disheartened during the phase, thinking that the future of jailbreaking was in dark.

iOS 6.1.1 Untethered Jailbreak Photo: Apple Windows developer and security researcher iMast777 has figured out a way that allows developers to jailbreak their A4-based devices running on the very first beta of iOS 6.1.1.

However, things have seemingly started to get back on track now as big names like pod2g and planetbeing have once again come to the forefront, making the people believe that jailbreaking is not dying down just yet.

It was planetbeing, who revealed via his Twitter account last week that along with pod2g, he had managed to make some “nice progress” in terms of developing the highly anticipated exploit. Pod2g also responded saying that a couple of vulnerabilities had been discovered and that it was just the matter of figuring out the initial code execution that was playing a big role in holding back a public release of the jailbreak.

But a Wednesday report from iDownloadBlog pointed to another angle that brought the imminent iOS 6.1 firmware update to the scene. The report said that with the fourth beta of iOS 6.1 expiring Jan. 28, Apple is expected to release the fifth beta or push out the iOS 6.1 golden master, preceding a public release of the firmware.

“The most realistic time period for it to drop a new release — whether it be beta 5 or the golden master — would be tomorrow, the 24th, or Friday, the 25th,” said the report.

According to it, what makes the timing look crucial is the fact that iOS hackers, working on the iOS 6 untethered jailbreak, are apparently waiting for Apple to release the final version of iOS 6.1 before they finish up and release “the long awaited jailbreak.”

The report cited a recent tweet from pod2g in support of the assumption.

Photo: Twitter iOS 6 Untethered Jailbreak Release Date Buzz: Contemplating Reason For The Wait, Is It iOS 6.1?

“While it’s not exactly rocket science that the team working on the jailbreak would want to wait until iOS 6.1 dropped before burning its exploits, the fact that pod2g is basically begging Apple to release its firmware speaks volumes for how confident they are, and for how far they have progressed,” the report added.

So, how do all these provide a sneak peek into a possible time frame for the release of the iOS 6 untethered jailbreak? As the report noted, the next couple of days would be very crucial to watch out for since Apple could make a move by releasing the iOS 6.1 golden master and set the stage ready for a public release thereafter.

If Apple indeed does that, “it’s not outside the realm of possibilities to believe that an iOS 6 jailbreak is much closer then we think.”

With more developers proving their helping hand to the iOS 6 jailbreaking effort lately, the words of planetbeing, “the future is looking bright for jailbreaking,” do make sense. While Nikias Bassen, aka Pimskeks, has made his come back to the jailbreak front recently, Joshua Hill, aka p0sixninja, seems looking for webkit exploits.

So considering all these, how much weight do Bassen’s words, “no time to rest, time to get something done,” have?