This is an interesting piece of research and it confirms what many have long suspected – that sophisticated attack chains targeted at iOS are being constantly developed, and sooner or later there will be a big problem for Apple users. However, let’s not panic just yet: If this set of exploits is working in the wild this research has not found any evidence of it and, in fact, as the Google team note, “this was a failure case for the attacker:” However, the holy grail of iOS kernel compromise appears to be within reach and we should not be complacent. These are exploits delivered by a compromised or malicious web site, and as such, would lend themselves to phishing and waterhole campaigns where victims are lured or tricked into visiting the site for the malicious software to be run by their Safari browser. The best action users can take is to make sure their iOS devices are up to date with the latest patches from Apple – with the Apple ecosystem preventing the user (or malware purporting to be the user) side-loading apps from outside of the Apple store. It remains largely unnecessary to run separate AV software on iOS devices and in the case of the exploits researched by Google, AV would likely not have stopped data exfiltration anyway. If you’re on iOS, the simple advice is still to update your phone and allow it to reboot when it asks to (don’t keep telling it to do it “later”) and don’t “jailbreak” your device if you want to remain inside that cosy walled garden.  Read Less