For years Apple has been playing a game of cat and mouse with jailbreakers. Apple releases a new version of iOS, hackers get busy finding security vulnerabilities to exploit, a new jailbreak comes out utilizing those hard-earned exploits, and Apple fixes the security holes in a new iOS version. The cycle has been happening for years.
A team of hackers called the Evad3rs were responsible for the recent iOS 6 Evasi0n jailbreak, and Apple just released iOS 6.1.3 to patch the related security holes. Of the 6 exploits that were fixed, Apple has publicly credited 4 to the Evad3rs, all of which are chained together to give hackers root access to iOS.
Wish you could do more with Notification Center in iOS 6? Besides the couple of stock widgets Apple includes, there isn’t a lot of functionality to be found. On my iPhone, it usually feels like a waste of space. What if you could compose an email or quickly access your camera alongside notifications?
Jailbreaking allows you to do that and more, thanks to a couple of handy Cydia tweaks.
Adding photos and videos to a conversation in the iOS Messages app isn’t as streamlined as it could be. You have to tap the little camera icon, then tap whether you want to take a new photo or select one from your Camera Roll. It’s functional, but not optimal.
Let’s take a look at two jailbreak tweaks that help streamline the process of adding photos to messages.
Apple’s Reading List lets you save and sync links in iOS and OS X to read later on any iCloud-enabled device, but the feature is restricted to Safari. Due to the limited nature of Reading List and the fact that it hasn’t existed for that long, third-party services like Pocket and Instapaper are widely used for saving links to read later.
Apps like Tweetbot let you send links to Pocket or Instapaper quite easily, but what if you could send a webpage to your favorite read later service anywhere in iOS natively, including Safari? With a new jailbreak tweak called Readr, now you can.
After texting on the iPhone for awhile, you get used to seeing the “…” bubble mid-conversation. Whenever someone with iMessage is typing to you, the ellipsis bubble appears in that thread of the Message app. It helps you know that whoever you’re talking to is about to respond, and it also gives people away when they choose to start an iMessage and then stop.
What if you could see when someone was sending you an iMessage no matter where you are in iOS? The iPhone’s status bar would be the perfect place to display such a notifier, wouldn’t it?
Apple continues to add new capabilities to Siri, but there are still a lot of things the digital assistant can’t do. You can’t use Siri to control third-part music apps like Spotify, toggle settings, or search the App Store.
A jailbreak tweak called AssistantEnhancer takes Siri to the next level by doing all these things and more. It’s the new crown jewel of Siri tweaks, and it contains a ton of useful features that make Siri a more valuable tool.
Now that you’ve jailbroken your iPad on iOS 6 with Evasi0n the right way, it’s time to install the coolest tweaks and apps from Cydia, the jailbreak alternative to the App Store.
Wondering what you should install? Here’s a roundup of the very best jailbreak tweaks available for the iPad:
Apple released iOS 6.1.2 earlier today, and jailbreakers are officially safe from the brand new firmware. Two updates to iOS 6.1 have been released since the Evasi0n jailbreak was unleashed, and Apple has yet to patch the hack. It was revealed earlier today that 6.1.2 was still safe on Twitter.
The Evasi0n website has been updated to officially recognize 6.1.2 as a supported firmware version. You can download it now and use the free tool to jailbreak any iOS device running 6.1.2. Existing jailbreakers on 6.1 have no reason to update to 6.1.2 and re-jailbreak unless they are affected by the Microsoft Exchange bug.
Filippo Bigarella is a prolific and respected developer in the jailbreak community. The Italian teenager has released no less than 20 jailbreak tweaks and hacks in Cydia, the jailbreak alternative to the App Store. His work (e.g., Springtomize) has appeared numerous times on sites such as this one. To put it simply, he makes some of the best jailbreak tweaks there are. He’s also a full-time student.
Bigarella has released yet another jailbreak tweak that animates the iPhone’s app icons. The tweak itself is pretty simple, but the reason behind its release is special: funding pediatric cancer research.
