JailbreakMe 3.0 continues its steady growth with 2 million jailbreaks already applied since the tool came out (officially) last week. The news was delivered by Grant Paul (also known as @chpwn) via his Twitter account.
Grant Paul is one of the main contributors of JailbreakMe. In a tweet, he made it official:
This comes just three days after the same contributor made it be known that JailbreakMe 3.0 had been used 1 million times just one day after the tool was officially released. This new figure isn’t counting the many jailbreaks that probably took place when a pre-release version of the tool leaked this past weekend.
JailbreakMe’s popularity comes from the fact that it’s the easiest possible method to jailbreak any iOS-based device on the face of the earth, and for the first time, apply a fully untethered jailbreak on the iPad 2. Unlike other methods that require a computer connection and some knowledge on the inner-workings of iOS, JailbreakMe only requires an Internet connection and 5 minutes to spare. Thanks to an (as of yet unpatched) vulnerability in Mobile Safari, Cydia can easily be loaded onto any device by simply pointing Safari to JailbreakMe’s website. The process itself takes just a few minutes and the final result is exactly the same as the one a user would get from using other tools.
This tool isn’t being left unnoticed by Apple’s engineers, who are reportedly working around the clock to patch the vulnerability that allows it to work, in an upcoming version of iOS, known as 4.3.4 (the latest publicly-available version is 4.3.3). Although this Safari vulnerability greatly benefits members of the jailbreaking community, it can also be exploited by any ill-intentioned hacker who may manage to get an unsuspecting user to open a maliciously-crafted PDF file. The vulnerability is so serious that a German Government body posted a warning on its website. If you’re planning on applying JailbreakMe, however, stay away from iOS 4.3.4 once it gets released.
In order to protect your jailbroken phone, you can install PDF Patcher 2, a custom tweak that patches this vulnerability. If you do this, you can enjoy the benefits of iOS 4.3.4 and still have a jailbroken device.
If you want to find out how to jailbreak your iPad using JailbreakMe 3.0, check out this write-up. If you’re using an iPhone or iPod touch, you can read up our tutorial on that as well.
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