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Journalists Cover Microsoft, Using Macs

It’s not an easy time for Microsoft — with Steve Ballmer having to field questions about being “buffoons” and an “evil empire”  at the shareholder’s meeting (.doc) — so when they get together “the world’s most influential technology pundits and online writers” (nb: we weren’t invited) for Mobius to discuss super-secret mobile tech you’d think [...]

Guide To Black Friday Apple Bargains: Cheap MacBooks, iPods and Accessories Galore

Here’s a guide for finding the best bargains on Apple-related gear during the infamous Black Friday sales on November 27. We’ve compiled a comprehensive list of gear from leaked photos of sales flyers and descriptions of sales.
The bargains include a 2.26 GHz MacBook + $150 gift card at Best Buy for $999.99 ; a 32GB [...]

Review: Voices Is Today’s Best Thing Ever, Grab It Now While It’s Cheap

New on the App Store is Voices from the clever folk at Tap Tap Tap. You can guess what it does.

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Review: Sony Walkman S540 Series Video MP3 Player

Press releases, you will hardly be surprised to hear, are rarely very interesting. But one arrived in my inbox a couple of weeks ago that made me double-take.
“Sony’s S Series Walkman,” it chattered, “is a serious challenger to the iPod Nano.” Gosh, really? Perhaps the Cult had better have a look at one, then, despite [...]

Major Security Hole in iPhone Firmware — And How To Fix It

passcode.jpgUPDATE: You can fix the hole by remapping the “Home” button. In the iPhone’s Settings/General/Home Button, assign double clicking the Home button to “Home” — not “Phone Favorites.”

iPhone’s 2.0.2 firmware allows almost full access to your iPhone even when it’s under password protection, according to a report in MacRumors. Access can be gained through the “Emergency Call” keypad that appears on the passcode entry screen, allowing unrestricted use of Safari’s browser as well as access to Mail, SMS, Contacts, Maps and more.

Here’s how it works:

1. On the passcode screen hit “Emergency Call” button at bottom left.

2. In the Emergency Call screen, hit the “Home” button twice. You’ll be taken to the Favorites screen.

3. From there, hit the blue arrow next to a contact’s name.

4. You can now access all the iPhone’s functions by selecting their email address, homepage URL or address.

5. For example — hit the contact’s “Homepage” URL — and you are straight into Safari.

6.  Hit the email address, and you enter Mail. Cancel the message, and you have full access to the iPhone’s email.

Via MacRumors

About the author

Lonnie Lazar

Lonnie Lazar is a writer, musician, web designer attorney. He writes about Apple for Cult of Mac and Mac|Life, and about VoIP and telecommunications for Voxilla. Follow Lonnie on Twitter @LonnieLazar, join the Cult of Mac on Facebook, and find Lonnie's photos on Flickr.

Email the author | Read more posts by Lonnie Lazar.

5 comments

    [...] CultofMac via Macrumors Forums] Categories Filed Under: Apple, Inc., Security, Uh Oh, iPhone Comments [0] [...]

    Has anybody else noticed that in addition to the lack of security regarding the Home button you can also dial any number from the “Emergency Call Only” part of the menu? I thought you were only supposed to dial 911 from this?! So that basically means not only could somebody have total access to your favorites/email/web/google maps they could also make any phone call they want anywhere! :-(

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