[HN Gopher] iPhone 11 emulation done in QEMU
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iPhone 11 emulation done in QEMU
Author : 71bw
Score : 180 points
Date : 2025-06-12 15:04 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (github.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
| msgodel wrote:
| Woah this sounds like it boots all the way to Springboard at
| least! That's pretty huge!
| ewuhic wrote:
| Does it support trollstore with ability to decrypt IPAs?
| skvmb wrote:
| Came here to ask this very question. This would be killer if
| so!
| mywittyname wrote:
| For the ignorant: what does this mean?
| tom1337 wrote:
| trollstore is an inofficial app store for iOS devices which
| does not require a jailbreak. There are also apps that seem
| to decrypt the encrypted IPA (which is the file format of an
| iOS app) so you can view the decrypted app code and the
| resources. it's kinda the same as decompiling a android java
| app.
| watusername wrote:
| Just to expand a bit on the sibling comment, IPAs downloaded
| from the App Store are encrypted with a DRM scheme with a key
| tied to the Apple account. The binaries actually stay
| encrypted on-disk and the OS has facilities to transparently
| decrypt them when executed. The usual way of decrypting is to
| actually execute the app, attach a debugger (normally not
| possible for production apps) and read the decrypted code
| from memory.
| gnabgib wrote:
| Discussion on upstream repo (356 points, 2022, 144 comments)
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30545425
|
| Related (mentions this repo): _Emulating an iPhone in QEMU_ (268
| points, 2 months ago, 64 comments)
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43592409
| msgodel wrote:
| Looking at the issue tracker it sounds like they've made
| significant progress since then.
| walterbell wrote:
| Progress update, https://eshard.com/posts/emulating-
| ios-14-with-qemu-part2 iOS emulated in QEMU
| with: * Restore / Boot * Software rendering
| * Kernel and userspace debugging * Pairing with the
| host * Serial / SSH access * Multitouch *
| Network * Install and run any arbitrary IPA
|
| In other news, Cellebrite acquired Corellium iOS/Android
| virtualization for $170M,
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44221982
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| Presumably to build a exploit test framework.
| bri3d wrote:
| The eShard thing and this GitHub are fairly different, as
| far as I know.
|
| The eShard people found an earlier version of this
| repository and set about patching one billion parts of the
| iOS kernel, library cache, and userland to make it run on
| the limited emulator.
|
| Meanwhile, the actual emulator has been advancing, arguably
| more quickly than the eShard patch set.
|
| The current set of patches needed for the latest commits on
| this repo to run iOS are less than 10 instructions, all to
| enable the software-rendering/framebuffer fallback code
| path instead of trying to use display drivers.
|
| https://github.com/ChefKissInc/QEMUAppleSilicon/wiki/Filesy
| s...
| anthk wrote:
| How does Qemu m68k work for Classic Mac BTW?
| LeoPanthera wrote:
| Not great. Use Mini vMac instead.
|
| PPC emulation works fine though.
| lioeters wrote:
| It works. Technical discussions on running classic Macintosh
| with Qemu m68k:
|
| Qemu-system-m68k to run Mac OS 7-8 -
| https://www.emaculation.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=37&sid=6a9...
| dd_xplore wrote:
| Is it emulating iOS? Or only running iOS binaries? Why does it
| specifically say iPhone 11?
| worldsavior wrote:
| Probably because it's iPhone 11 binaries.
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(page generated 2025-06-12 23:00 UTC)