Chronic Dev Team

iPhone Dev Team member MuscleNerd has confirmed that an untethered jailbreak for iOS 5.1.1 will be released this week. Over the weekend, pod2g tweeted that "something big" was going to happen at the Hack In The Box security conference in Amsterdam being held May 21 through May 25. He later added that a public release was only a few days away. On Monday, MuscleNerd released an iOS 5.1.1 "info sheet" that revealed how the iPhone 3GS and iPod 3G made the jailbreak cut.

The upcoming jailbreak will be released via multiple tools just like the iOS 5.0.1 jailbreak was (e.g. cinject, RedSn0w, and Absinthe). All current iOS devices will be supported except for AppleTV 3. For a complete list of supported devices click here. MuscleNerd's "info sheet" is posted below.

The Dev Team has released redSn0w version 0.9.10b8b which brings only a minor bug fix. According to the Dev Team blog, the "0.9.10b8b update to redsn0w makes the zip files more compatible with the native Windows explorer (which doesn’t like leading slashes in the filenames)." The previous version released a few weeks ago helped users take advantage of the popular SAM unlock method.

In the meantime, the jailbreak community is closer to releasing an untethered jailbreak for iOS 5.1. Currently only A4 and A5 devices on iOS 5.0.1 and lower are jailbreakable. A4 devices can upgrade to iOS 5.1 but they will have to go tethered. Hopefully there is an untethered solution for all iOS devices right around the corner.

Things have been pretty quiet on the jailbreak front since the launch of the iPad 3. Today Absinthe and Corona developer pod2g broke the silence on his Twitter feed. Pod2g tweeted that he has acquired all the exploits needed to jailbreak iOS 5.1. While it's good to know that our favorite iPhone hackers are closer to a solution, fellow DevTeam member Chpwn reminded everyone that even though "all the exploits are found, this doesn't mean that a jailbreak exists," and it could be months away from a public release.

In February, iOS hacker i0n1c posted a few pictures of a jailbroken iPad 2 running iOS 5.1. The DevTeam also wrote on their blog that someone "close to the Cydia repo scene" was working on an entirely new jailbreak method.

As expected Apple has stopped signing iOS 5.0.1 with the release of iOS 5.1. If you own a jailbroken device you should not update to 5.1 because it breaks both the Corona untether and the Absinthe exploit. The Dev-Team warned both veteran and amateur jailbreakers about the dangers of upgrading on Wednesday.

iPhone 4S and iPad 2 users who did not heed the warning won't be able to downgrade back to 5.0.1 even if they did save their SHSH blobs. People with earlier devices and saved SHSH blobs can downgrade with the assistance of geohot’s limera1n exploit. There is also a tethered jailbreak for non-A5 devices if you really have the urge to get to 5.1.

I'm not sure updating to iOS 5.1 is worth losing your untethered jailbreak, but non-A5 users can sacrifice their freedom if they want to. iPhone 4S users should avoid 5.1 if they want to keep their jailbreak. However, non-iPhone 4S owners can keep their devices jailbroken by downloading redsn0w 0.9.10b6. This version is a tethered 5.1 jailbreak for non-A5 devices.

A tethered jailbreak requires that your device is plugged into a computer whenever turned on. Untethered jailbreaks offer the freedom of not using a computer every time your device reboots. Most jailbreakers prefer untethered to tethered. Since iOS 5.1 doesn't offer anything worth losing your untethered jailbreak over I would suggest avoiding it entirely. However, if you are dead set on getting to 5.1 read on for the Dev Team's warning and instructions.