iOS 8 and iOS 8.1 Untethered Jailbreak Tool Released
Great news for iOS 8 and iOS 8.1 users, the Chinese jailbreaking team Pangu has released their latest iOS 8 software tool that can jailbreak any iPhone, iPod or iPad running Apple’s latest iOS 8 software.
Pangu’s release came quick to the market, considering it takes several months for teams to release a jailbreak tool along with an untethered version. Pangu is the same team of Chinese hackers to jailbreak iOS 7 on the iPhone, iPod and iPad as well.
The group released a developer version of their jailbreak tool online, publishing the download on their official website. The team quickly removed the download link noting it unavailable at the moment, with an official announcement on their Twitter account stating:
Current Pangu Jailbreak v1.0.0 is disabled remotely because we are fixing bug which may cause lost of your photos. Please wait …
— PanguTeam (@PanguTeam) October 22, 2014
Pangu’s developer edition release of the iOS 8 jailbreak tool does not come with the Cydia app store, making the tool essentially useless for average iOS unlocking enthusiasts. Cydia is an app store that comes preinstalled when jailbreaking an iOS device, allowing users to install tweaks, hacks and non-Apple verified applications.
As Cydia is not pre-installed in Pangu’s iOS 8 jailbreak release, average jailbreak enthusiasts may want to hold off on modifying their devices just yet.
The Pangu team only made the iOS 8jJailbreak tool available for the Windows operating system thus far, but has noted a Mac OS X release will follow shortly after. As well, the tool is currently fully coded in Chinese, and there are currently no English versions of the tool available online. Meaning users who cannot read or follow Chinese, may have a hard time jailbreaking their iOS 8 device.
Cydia developer, Jay Freeman (saurik), is also working on making a compatible version of Cydia for this jailbreak, according to a thread on Reddit.
“So, windknown has contacted me, about a half hour ago, via e-mail. He has told me one of the issues that is keeping Substrate from working on the device, which will probably require me to build a little binary patch for dyld as part of the Substrate installation sequence,” Saurik wrote in the Reddit thread.
Pangu has promised their iOS 8 and iOS 8.1 jailbreak tool has been tested and is working on all devices including the iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, iPhone 5s, iPad mini 3, iPad Air 2, and the older iPad Air.
There are many benefits to jailbreaking an iOS device, along with downsides. With a jailbroken device, iOS users have the ability to install third party software packages not certified by Apple. Meaning users can install tweaks, operating system hacks, change the boot logo, change app icons, install custom themes among other endless activities. One downside is if users jailbreak their iOS device, the warranty is automatically voided.
Also, the device is left open to security holes and more susceptible to hackers if a faulty or rogue tweaks are installed. In August we saw the Chinese malware, AdThief, infecting jailbroken iOS devices due to a rogue tweak users had installed. Later, we saw the Xsser Trojan spying on jailbroken iOS devices in many countries. jailbreaking a device doesn’t necessarily open direct security holes in the device, it just allows hackers to easily infiltrate the device as users can install unverified malware-laced apps.
For the average iOS jailbreak enthusiasts, we recommend you hold off if eager to jailbreak your iOS 8 device. This is due to the current lack of features, no Cydia and the app being fully encoded in the Chinese language. We will keep our readers covered with the latest iOS 8 jailbreak news when it becomes available.
