TrendMicro sponsored Mobile Pwn2Own contest witnessed white hat hackers exploiting flaws in WiFi and Safari Browser to hack into an Apple iPhone 7. The hacking contest not only exposed flaws on Apple devices, but also brought the vulnerabilities exhibited by Samsung Galaxy S8, and Huawei Mate 9 Pro into the limelight.
Note- Mobile Pwn2Own Contest is being hosted at PacSec Security Conference being held in Tokyo, Japan.
Researchers from Tencent Keen Security Lab succeeded in hacking the Apple iPhone 7 running on the latest iOS 11.1 to win a prize money of $110,000 with 11 Master of Pwn Points. In a second hack, the same team targeted the Safari browser and earned Tencent Keen Security Lab $45,000 and 12 Master of Pwn points.
Along with an iPhone 7, researchers were also able to find exploits for the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Huawei Mate 9 Pro- both in great demand among mobile phone users of United States. The security experts who hacked these phones received a total sum of $350,000.
Pwn2Own is a program run by TrendMicro to promote Zero Day Initiative. Technically, the program is meant to reward security researchers for disclosing major vulnerabilities to tech companies like Apple and Google.
And as soon as the flaws are exposed by researchers, companies are given a 90-day time frame to produce patches. If they fail to do so, then bugs are publicly disclosed which can encourage black hat hackers to create more trouble.
