Black Hat
9 HN recommenders · recommended in 17 months, 2016–2026
51:32 · 127K views · Aug 16, 2016
Apple security head Ivan Krstic gives a Black Hat 2016 talk on iOS security, covering HomeKit, Auto Unlock and iCloud Keychain. He explains key hierarchies and how data can stay safe even in adversarial clouds.
HN repeatedly recommends it as the deepest public look at how iCloud Keychain and Apple's device and cloud security are designed.
20 comments from Hacker News
I tried 1Password but finally resolved to use iCloud keychain after watching this BlackHat 2016 video this video . I mean as far as I already trust their OS nothing can really protect me from being spied by them if they are ill intentioned, so as long as they are serious and patch their security flaw on a timely manner I can live with that. Beside it come as a free plan if you don't need more than 5GB of iCloud storage. I'd figure using an external password manager just add another third party I need to trust and the fact that 1Password offer browser app interface (on top of native) don't reassure me in any way. Of course if I'd ever need to reassess my threat model because I can't trust Apple anymore, I will quit iCloud service at the same time as their OS and go full FOSS.
This is not just encryption in transit or simplistic client-side encryption. It is end-to-end encryption, where each device's key generation is handled by your phone's Secure Enclave. This article is a decent starting point in terms of what Advanced Data Protection is: [LINK] If you want a deeper dive into the security engineering of iCloud Keychain, the second half of this Blackhat talk by Apple's head of Security Engineering & Architecture (SEAR) is really great: Synchronizing secrets: this video
The Black Hat talk was really great: this video (link is to SEP and on-device encryption, 22:30 is iCloud stuff) > I know they said they could have accessed that San Bernardino terrorist’s iCloud backup if only they had one. Not sure if they’ve change the security architecture since then. I actually think they have, the shooting was in 2015 and iOS 10 was released in 2016 and was first to have some of the features he talks about in the video.
There have been several comments along the lines of: "Why should I trust apple and their security, but not that of a third-party web browser?" I don't have an answer for you. But I want to recommend this talk from 7 years ago: this video That alone convinced me. Apple knows what it is doing when it comes to device security. Today, I trust them with my most sensitive data and sleep peacefully at night.
You shouldn't include Apple in this. As of macOS Tahoe, the FileVault key you (optionally) escrow with Apple is stored in the iCloud Keychain, which is cryptographically secured by HSM-backed, rate-limited protections. You can (and should) watch this video for all the details about how iCloud is protected.