Court documents obtained by media have revealed the FBI has specific tools that allow the bureau to access private Signal messages even on locked iPhones.
As per the documents, the FBI can intercept encrypted messages from iPhones in partial AFU mode, which is a short form for After Frist Unlock.
The clues were obtained through Seamus Hughes at the Program on Extremism at the George Washington University. The court documents contained screenshots of Signal Messages exchanged during 2020 between male accused charged for running a gun trafficking operation in NY.
Signal Chats Excerpts
The documents [PDF] filed by the Department of Justice and obtained by Forbes contained excerpts from Signal chats extracted from one of the iPhone devices obtained from the accused. The chats revealed that they not only discussed weapon trades but attempted murder too.
The screenshots showed metadata indicating that the FBI decrypted the Signal app on their phone during the partial AFU mode, a state when iPhones are most vulnerable to data extraction as encryption keys are stored in memory. Any hacker or hacking device can piece together the keys to unlock private data stored in the device.
FBI’s Favorite Hacking Tools
It doesn’t come as a surprise since the FBI has a reputation for using various tools to hack mobile devices. Security firms like court unlock iphones access signal messages
