Appls has released minor software updates for the iPhone and iPad. The good news is that they fix a potentially dangerous exploit that allowed hackers to push code to your device through the web browser using corrupted PDF files. The bad news is that’s exactly how the Jailbreakme.com web-based tool for jailbreaking devices works.

In other words, if you upgrade your iPhone or iPod touch to iOS 4.0.2 or your iPad to version 3.2.2, you won’t be able to jailbreak your device by visiting Jailbreakme.com.

Of course, there are other ways to jailbreak an iOS device, but they tend to be a bit more complicated.

If you’ve already jailbroken your device, you might want to hold off on updating to iOS 4.0.2, as it will likely remove your jailbreak.

On the other hand, if you haven’t jailbroken your device and you’re concerned that someone else could use the same exploit to run malicious code on your phone, then you probably will want to update. For those of you that have already jailbroken your device but who want some level of security, you can check out PDF Loading Warner, an app which lets you know when the Safari web browser is about to load a PDF file so you won’t be caught unaware. It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s better than nothing.

via TUAW

Brad Linder

Brad Linder is editor of Liliputing and Mobiputing. He's been tinkering with mobile tech for decades and writing about it since...

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