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3 main reasons why iOS is better than Android

iOS is the most secure of the modern mobile operating system. Experts Xaker, examining six popular software platforms on the market, called the main advantages of the Apple product.

Security is a comprehensive solution covering all facets of the use of the gadget from the communications and application isolation to low-level protection and data encryption. In this regard iOS is superior to Android, Windows 10 Mobile, BlackBerry 10, Sailfish and Samsung’s Tizen.

iOS is a closed ecosystem and devices running this OS are the most secure of the common business decisions, experts say. This applies mainly to the current models generations of the iPhone 6s and 7 (and SE). Older devices have a smaller margin of safety. For iPhone 5c, iPhone 5s and iPhone 6 are the ways to unlock the bootloader and attacks on the device password. But even for these legacy devices hacking loader is a labor — intensive and very expensive.

Physical security

  • All iPhone and iPad iOS 8.0 and later (and currently relevant iOS 10.3.2, which is even more secure) used as resistant protection methods that even their manufacturer, both formally and actually refuses to extract information from locked devices. Independent research (including laboratory Elcomsoft) confirm Apple’s claims.
  • IOS has (and really works) data protection in case of theft or loss of your device. Available mechanisms remote wipe and lock the device. The stolen device will not be able to unlock and resell, if the attacker is unknown as the on-device password and a separate password from the Apple ID account holder. (However, Chinese craftsmen available, and the intervention in the hardware is able to bypass this protection… for iPhone 5s and older devices.)
  • Multi-level data encryption “out of the box” is designed and implemented. The data partition is always encrypted; the block cipher is used with keys that are unique to each individual block, thus when you delete a file, the corresponding keys are removed — and thus to recover the deleted data impossible in principle. Keys are protected by a dedicated coprocessor, log on to the Secure Enclave, and to pull them out not even with a jailbreak (we tried). When enabled, the data remains encrypted until you enter the correct password. Moreover, some data (such as passwords to web sites, downloaded to the device e-mail) additionally encrypted in the protected storage, the Keychain, and some of them cannot be retrieved even with a jailbreak.
  • You can’t just stick to computer and iPhone to download the data (except photos). In iOS there is a possibility of establishing a trusting relationship with computers. This creates a pair of cryptographic keys that enable the trusted computer to do phone backup. But even this can be restricted by corporate policy security or proprietary application Apple Configurator. The safety backup is provided by the possibility to set a difficult password (password is only required to restore data from a backup, so daily use will not interfere).
  • Unlocking iPhone is made at a sufficiently safe level. To unlock, you can use standard PIN-code of four digits, and a more complex password. The only other method of unlocking the device — the fingerprint. The implementation of the mechanism is such that the attacker would have very little opportunity to use it. The data of the fingerprint is encrypted and will be deleted from RAM after shutdown or reboot; after some time, if the device is never released; after five failed attempts; after some time, if the user never enters a password to unlock the device.
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  • In iOS there is an option to automatically delete data after ten failed login attempts. Unlike BlackBerry 10, this option is controlled by the operating system; for older versions of iOS (up to iOS 8.2) there are ways to work around it.

Protection from surveillance

In iOS is to disable cloud sync through their iCloud service. In particular, are usually saved in iCloud backup of your device data, synchronized data — call history, notes, calendars, passwords in a “keychain iCloud”, passwords and history of visited resources in Safari browser, photos, and application data.

All kinds of cloud sync in iOS you can disable, just turn off iCloud and deactivating iCloud Drive. After that no data will be transmitted to Apple servers. Despite the fact that some mechanisms do not work too intuitively (as an example — to turn off synchronization calls need to disable iCloud Drive, actually designed to sync files and photos), a complete shutdown of cloud services synchronization completely disables.

IOS provides a mechanism to prevent surveillance (the system can present to the outside world random IDs modules Wi-Fi and Bluetooth instead of fixed real).

Malware protection

In iOS virtually eliminated the possibility of installing malicious SOFTWARE. Individual cases were (through applications collected using a hacked development tools), but they are quickly localized and remedied. Even then big harm to these applications are unable: iOS each application is securely isolated from the system and from other applications using the sandbox.

It should be noted that in iOS a long time ago was implemented granular control over app permissions. The user can separately allow or deny each application such things as the ability to work in the background (in Android, this is not possible), access location, notifications, and the like. The presence of these settings allows you to effectively limit the surveillance of the apps that made such surveillance as its primary business (this applies to both the application class Facebook and games like Angry Birds).

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Finally, Apple regularly updates iOS, even on older devices, almost instantly (compared to Android) correcting the found vulnerabilities. When updates arrive simultaneously to all users (again, “unlike”).

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