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This article will explain how you can fix a soft bricked Samsung Android phone.

In this guide we use a Samsung Galaxy S4 but the steps should work for any Samsung Android phone as long as you flash the correct stock firmware for the particular make and model of the Samsung Android phone you are wanting to recover.

Disclaimer: FlexiSPY is not responsible for the steps in this article. while they did work for us it was because we researched and used the correct files for our phone. Always make sure you back up the device if possible before proceeding and you follow the instructions carefully. This entire process is done at your own risk

What does soft bricked mean?

Soft bricked means that the phone turns on but no longer boots up to the Samsung operating system which means that the phone cannot be used.

Typical symptoms of a Samsung Android phone being soft bricked are the phone booting no further than the Samsung logo (and it can often just reboot over and over which is called a bootloop)

Or you see this screen as soon as the phone turns on.

What causes a Samsung Android phone to be soft bricked?

The phone being soft bricked is usually caused by the following:

• Incorrectly rooting the phone using Odin or the root process does not complete properly and you exit the program.
• Disconnecting the USB cable from your PC while rooting the Samsung Android phone.
• Disconnecting the USB cable from your PC while upgrading the firmware using Kies
• Anything else that causes the PC that the Samsung Android phone is connected to lose power (e.g. power failure) that stops whatever process is taking place (rooting, firmware upgrade etc.) to not complete.

Can a Samsung Android phone that is soft bricked be fixed?

As long as the phone turns on then the phone can be fixed.

As long as the phone can boot up in to Download mode it can be fixed.

We will now detail how to recover a soft bricked Samsung Android phone.

note: if the device is soft bricked there is no way to back it up before following any of these steps. flashing the stock firmware as shown below will delete all data on the samsung android phone – it will all be lost and cannot be recovered.

Our scenario:

For this article we are using a second Samsung Galaxy S4 that is running OS 4.4.3 which has never been rooted before. Now usually rooting is a very simple process and only takes a few minutes and we have a working guide to root the S4 here but, in the nature of science, using a different Samsung Galaxy S4 than the one we usually use resulted in Odin getting stuck during the root process.

On the second Samsung Android phone we used our Odin output looked like this:

<ID:0/003> Firmware update start..
<ID:0/003> SingleDownload.
<ID:0/003> boot.img
<ID:0/003> NAND Write Start!!
<ID:0/003> recovery.img
<ID:0/003> system.img
<ID:0/003> cache.img.ext4

It never got past this point and so the Samsung Galaxy S4 was never rooted and we waited an hour but the progress bar on the Samsung Galaxy S4 and on Odin on the PC failed to move so we disconnected the USB cable and now the device is soft bricked.

This means that, right now, when we turn on our Samsung Android phone (the S4) we get the following message: Firmware upgrade encountered an issue. Please select recovery mode in Kies & try again.

How do we fix it?

First of all, try Kies

As the steps say, try Kies to fix the issue.

We connected the S4 to our PC and ran Kies but it never actually recognised the phone. It just constantly said that the device was ‘connecting’ but failed to find out what the phone was which means that no options inside Kies can actually work and the steps given on the screen of our soft bricked Samsung Android phone cannot be followed.

Second, reinstall the stock OS software version

If Kies does not work (and, to be honest, it usually won’t), the next thing to do is get technical. This simply involves flashing the stock operating system software (the software that powers the phone which comes from Samsung) to the Samsung Android phone which should then allow it to boot up and everything should be fixed.

But how is this done?

First, for our soft bricked phone we put it in to Download mode.

• Turn off the S4 completely
• Hold down the volume down, home and power buttons together
• Wait for the S4 to turn on and it should boot in to download mode

If you have done it correctly it boot in to recovery mode and you then press the Volume up button to continue and it will be in download mode.

We then downloaded the stock firmware for the Samsung Galaxy S4 that we were using and we connected the soft bricked Samsung Android phone to our PC and flashed the stock ROM using Odin

The flashing process will take quite some time and, as you have gathered, Do not disconnect the phone from the pc in any way while this is in progress.

When it’s finished, the Samsung phone will reboot and Odin will display a Blue RESET! notification. Then, after the phone boots up for the first time it will display a Green PASS! notification

However, now that the hard part is done, some things may still remain.

• The Samsung Android phone may get stuck booting up on the Samsung logo
• The Samsung Android phone may boot up to the Samsung logo and continually restart itself.
• The phone no longer has a working IMEI number and cannot make calls (‘Mobile Network not available’).

These are easy to fix, to fix them you put the Samsung Android phone in to recovery mode.

To do this you do the following.

• Turn off the Samsung Android phone completely (remove the battery if needed).
• Disconnect the phone from the PC.
• Press and hold the Volume up key, the home key and the power key.
• Keep these buttons pressed and held until the Samsung model number appears
• Let go and then the phone should be in recovery mode.

On our S4 we performed the following steps and it looked like this:

Using the Volume up and Volume down keys to navigate the menu and the Power button to select an option you need to do the following.

• Navigate to wipe data/factory reset and select the option.
• Navigate to Yes – delete all user data and select the option.
• Wait for it to complete.

Now that you have performed a factory reset you also need to reset the user cache.

• Navigate to wipe cache partition and select the option.
• Wait for it to complete.
• The Samsung Android phone will reboot itself and will boot up properly for the first time. This can take a while so please be patient.

If, after the phone has booted up you find that you no longer have a cell signal and that your IMEI number is incorrect – e.g. 004999010640000/01 (Settings > More > About Device > Status > IMEI) then you need to download the modem file from here, save it to your PC and extract it.

Put the Samsung Galaxy S4 in to download mode again and connect it to your PC and run Odin (see step 4 for more information).

It will look like This Picture once connected as we have seen before

Click the CP button and then point to the Modem binary file shown in the last screenshot

Odin should now look like This Picture . You can see the S4 has been added and the modem file is selected.

Click Start to flash the modem and wait.

DO NOT DISCONNECT THE S4 FROM THE PC OR TURN IT OFF IN ANY WAY

Once it has been done wait for the S4 to reboot and you should now have your working IMEI back and the phone will work as normal and you can now make calls.

Can this be used to fix any soft bricked Samsung Android phone – not just the S4?

Technically yes. Simply make sure that you choose the correct stock ROM for whatever Samsung Android phone you are working on – the rest of the steps are the same.

In fact we have already discussed this in several articles relating to the Samsung Galaxy S4 and Samsung Android phones because the process for downgrading an OS, upgrading an OS or returning the Samsung Android phone to the OS it came with from the factory (which should fix the soft brick issue) have already been covered and are the same for every Samsung Android phone.

For example you can use this article to both fix a soft bricked Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and downgrade a Samsung Galaxy Grand – it is not limited to just the Samsung Galaxy S4.

To find and download the stock OS we use the website here.

Click Firmware Database to be taken to the page below

Under TYPE, OS, MODEL and COUNTRY select the values that match your Samsung Android phone.

Click the ROM you want to download

Make sure the details are correct for the Samsung Android phone you are working with and then click the Download button

Once it has been downloaded extract it to your computer as shown in This Picture

Please note that the ROM files can be several gigabytes in size and downloading them may take some time

You now need to flash the firmware that was downloaded on to the Samsung Android phone you are working with which we have already explained here and in several other articles on the FlexiSPY blog and that should fix the soft brick issue.

NOTE: WHEN FIXING THE IMEI ISSUE YOU MUST LOOK FOR THE CORRECT MODEM BINARY FILE FOR THE SAMSUNG ANDROID PHONE YOU ARE WORKING WITH – TRY SITES SUCH AS XDA FORUMS FOR THIS.

As you can see Odin and the ability to flash ROMS is a very important skill to have when working with Samsung Android phones. Obviously there is some risk involved if you pick the wrong OS or if you try to root the phone and it fails or if you flash the incorrect modem binary file (or cannot find it) to fix the IMEI issue but as long as the phone can get in to Download mode then nothing is ever really broken.

Samsung in fact make it much easier than other Android phone manufacturers to work with custom ROMS and performed advanced technical operations on the Android when compared to, say, HTC for example.

Let us know in the comments if you have any questions or issues about fixing a soft bricked Samsung Android phone and we will be happy to help.

“You’ve probably heard about the celebrity pictures that were stolen and linked all over over the internet.. Furthermore you probably also know that Apple’s iCloud was -at least in part- at fault”

But what you may not be aware of is just how easy the whole thing was, and how, using applications that are simple to find, you too can gain access to practically anyone’s iCloud account – and you don’t need to be a hacker to do it.

Notice: Everything in this article is for educational purposes only. Apple most likely have fixed the exploits that lead to the data leak so this is just a proof of concept article showing how it was most likely done. FlexiSPY is not responsible for any damages, loss or anything else that incurs if you do try to recreate these steps.

How Did The Leak Happen?

According to reports it was simply due to the accounts that were compromised being unsecure. For example they failed to turn on two-step notification for their account or their password was just too easy to guess. Once access was gained in to the accounts, and because most iPhone users happily let their device upload all pictures to their iCloud account without ever thinking of the consequences, a second piece of software was used to then download all backups of said iPhone.

Once those backups were downloaded the same program was used to explore its contents and this includes the pictures and videos that are now all over the internet and are being investigated by the FBI

So who is to blame? Apple for not making it clear enough that iCloud backs up everything? Apple for not making sure two-step sign up is mandatory? The user for not really fully understanding the implications of having their data stored in the cloud which can potentially be hacked?

If you own an iPhone every picture you take is uploaded to your iCloud account once you have signed in to the iPhone using your Apple ID. However this can be easily turned off (we stress that Apple have fixed the exploits so that passwords cannot be guessed by brute force which makes this hack no longer possible) so that you are no longer vulnerable.

The process that led to the leak consists of several steps.

2 Ways It Might Have Been Pulled Off

1. First off, the hackers needed to have access or know the email address of the persons targeted.
2. They used those email addresses to login to iCloud and guess the security password
3. They gained access to the account and then proceeded to download any iCloud backups.

Or it could have been done this way:

1. The hackers knew the email addresses of the people they wanted to target.
2. Hackers used a brute force tool and password list to guess the passwords.3. They gained access to the acocunt and then proceeded to download the iCloud backups.

Either way, one thing that hasn’t come to the surface yet is how the hackers got the email addresses to start with.

However there are many darknets where information like this is traded via the use of the encrypted TOR browser.

Replicating The Hack

This is done entirely for educational processes and, from the latest information, Apple have already fixed the iCloud vulnerabilities. So, for this we will just show you, hypothetically how it was done but we will investigate the software used to download and extract iCloud backups in more detail.

The first thing is to obviously know the email address of the people you wish to target. We are using our own Apple ID that we have set up which already contains an iCloud backup. However the program that is being pointed at to guess the passwords was called iBrute.

This is a small program written in Python that will try to brute force (guess the password) of all email addresses in the mail.txt file using the passwords in the passlist.txt file. However in the release notes it confirms as we have said, Apple have patched the exploit which means the program will no longer work.

So, for this, we are going to assume that we already have an account (Apple ID) whose password we know (which we do) so, because Apple fixed the exploit the next step is written from the perspective that iBrute worked and gave us an email address and password.

Before we proceed to the next section we need to understand just how iCloud works on an iPhone after you enter your Apple ID which is like this.

1. Enter your Apple ID on the iPhone – iCloud is enabled by default which photo sharing enabled.
2. Set up a new photo stream on the iPhone and add pictures – wait for them to be uploaded to iCloud
3. For PC download and install the iCloud Control Panel
4. Once it is installed you are asked to log in to iCloud.
5. You then click the Options button under Photos to see the photos that were be uploaded to iCloud
6. You can set the options to upload all photo streams from the iPhone to iCloud.
7. You can then see the iCloud photos that are stored on your PC.

What you may not be aware of is that even though photo sharing is enabled by default it is not as easy as logging in to any iCloud account and viewing the pictures online. iCloud does not work that way and even though we have set up a photo stream as a test it will not appear on the iCloud website.

Below you can see the photo stream on our PC we are using. We have added 3 extra pictures (you can just drag and drop any image file into the iCloud photos folder and it will sync.

So, if we log in to iCloud directly we see the following – no pictures of any kind.

So how does iCloud actually work?

1. Sign into iCloud on any iDevice using your Apple ID
2. Set up photo streaming and photo sharing in iCloud
3. Take some pictures or videos on the device
4. Login to a new iDevice with the same account.
5. All pictures and videos taken will appear on the new device.

So essentially iCloud is the backend that hosts and shares all pictures and vides (and other content such as emails and contacts) between all iDevices your account is logged in to but this also means that picture and videos backed up to iCloud are only visible on the specific iDevice.

So how do you get access to the pictures or videos if you cannot do it directly from iCloud itself?

This is the next thing we will discuss and where things get clever.

Backing Up To iCloud

Apple makes it pretty damn easy to back up data to the cloud, in-fact, it’s enabled on a persons iOS device by default. This includes automatic backup of photos from the camera roll.

All you need to be back up the phone is to make sure that your phone is charging, connected to wifi, and is locked. Once the device is backed (specifically iCloud) you’re able to perform the same steps that the hackers used to get access to the information.

Apple, for some strange reason, do not allow any iCloud backup to be password protected so it essentially means that should someone find software that can download all backups from an Apple ID and the respective iCloud account then they potentially have access to very personal or sensitive information.

This is what the hackers did

And this is what we will show you too (for educational purposes only)

The first thing you need is the PC software that was used which is called Elcomsoft Phone Password Breaker.  This is from a Moscow based company and the software is sold on the basis that it allows you to recover files from phone backups from variety of different manufacturers (Apple, BlackBerry, and Microsoft) and is to be only used for legal purposes only.

However looking at their main menu for a start tells you that this software could definitely be used for all the wrong reasons.

Decrypt Backup – Simply drag and drop any iPhone or iPad backup made within iTunes in to this option for it to be decrypted and for you to be able to view all data stored inside the backup.

Explore keychain – The keychain is encrypted by Apple and contains all the passwords on the device (iPhone or iPad). Again, just drop an iTunes backup on to this option to view all passwords used on the phone across all installed applications that have been stored in the keychain.

For those who are interested the keychain stores the following information:

1. Secure certificates
2. Tokens (e.g. Twitter, Facebook etc.)
3. Browser stored passwords
4. Wi-Fi passwords for all networks a device was connected at least once
5. Passwords, tokens and certificates stored by various applications

And the final option is what we are looking for – Download backup from iCloud.

It is obvious that the hackers just entered the email address and passwords of the people in question (which they obtained illegally as we explained) and then the software does the rest. For us we will be getting the data from the phone we just backed up.

So we put in the username and password of our Apple ID that we set up for this exercise and then we sign in and our backup is clearly listed at the top.

We then click the Download button and after a short time we can then choose any kind of information we want from inside the online backup.

All we are really concerned about is the camera roll as that is where all videos and pictures are stored but this software allows us to grab any and all information from an iCloud backup associated with the Apple ID that was used to sign in.

Essentially you just wait for the data to be downloaded to your PC and then you can pretty much do anything with it as you wish.

Apple makes this possible due to iCloud not having two step verification when you sign in (e.g. you sign in with a username and password and then answer a security question) which means that, as we have shown, just get the email address and password of an Apple ID and you potentially have access to phone backups which contains clearly sensitive and personal information.

How Can You Stop This From Happening?

The easiest way to stop yourself and your iDevice from becoming the next victim is simple.

1. Make sure your Apple ID password is strong
2. Turn off iCloud backups on the iDevice itself
3. Use a cloud system with better backup and security such as Dropbox

Apple have since patched the brute force method used but they have still not improved iCloud security to encompass two step verification although, in the wake of this scandal, we hardly think Apple will rest and leave their premier cloud backup solution with such a gaping hole in it for the whole world to look in.

We hope that you have found this article useful. Don’t forget that you can actually use FlexiSPY on your own iPhone or iPad to act as a secure and effective device backup tool so, if this interests you, why not check out a 24 hour demo of FlexiSPY right now?

You can now install and run FlexiSPY Premium & Extreme as well as FlexiSPY iPad on any jailbroken iOS device running iOS 7.1.2!

This now means that you can now get the same unrivalled IM capturing capabilities on iOS 7.1.2 as well as great signature FlexiSPY features such as spy call and call interception.

How can I get FlexiSPY on my iOS 7.1.2 device?

The first thing you need to do is jailbreak the device, we have a guide for that, which explains all the steps, that you can read, here All it takes is a few minutes and the TARGET device in your hand to jailbreak the device with help from access to a PC and you will be up and jailbroken in no time. After being jailbroken, the installation of FlexiSPY will be as simple as ever, so why not start enjoying FlexiSPY on your jailbroken iOS 7.1.2 device today!

Get FlexiSPY For iOS

Recently news broke that a group of Chinese hackers successfully released a working jailbreak for iOS 7.1.2 devices. For those who have been holding off on upgrading from iOS 6.x.x because they did not want to lose the jailbreak this is surely welcome news however there are a few questions that need to be asked about this jailbreak and whether it really is legitimate or not.

WHAT IS PANGU?

Pangu is the name of the jailbreaking application for iOS 7.1.2. Currently it is released on Windows only so those who have Macs and wish to jailbreak their iOS 7.1.2 device are currently out of luck. However there are already warning signs as to the legitimacy of the jailbreak before you even download the jailbreak tool – starting with the download URL.

http://dl.pangu.25pp.com/jb/ (this is not the full download link – see below for that)
25pp.com is a well-known Chinese piracy site and the jailbreak application, once downloaded, tries to install spyware in the form of the 25pp iPhone app -the old version does this, the new one contains no spyware- but how is this even possible? If the jailbreak application tries to install spyware how can the actual jailbreak be deemed trustworthy?

As you can see from the screenshot above the UI of the jailbreak tool takes a lot from what we have already seen from evad3rs, the process shouldn’t be too difficult

Below are two guides, one to jailbreak iOS 7.1.2 safely and the other for those who have already jailbroken iOS 7.1.2 using Pangu and want to stop the application from doing whatever nefarious reasons it has to dial out.

HOW TO JAILBREAK IOS 7.1.2 SAFELY

Below are steps to jailbreak IOS 7.1.2 safely without installing any nasty 25pp spyware.

Alternatively you can watch either the Mac or PC video and follow along.

It should be noted that we are not responsible for any damage that may be done to your phone by following this tutorial. Also be aware that you might have to complete the process twice on a 5s, the first attempt, the device will ‘blue screen’, wait for the iPhone to reboot, then re run Pangu on your PC, and follow the guide again.

Step 1- Download and run the Pangu jailbreak from the link below.

Pangu For Mac

Pangu For PC

Step 2 – Run the Pangu jailbreak application in Administrator mode on your PC, and uncheck the box (the most current version of pangu no longer has the option for unchecking the box)

Step 3 – Connect your iPhone or iPad that is running iOS 7.1.2.

Step 4 – This is where things get interesting. The jailbreak tool uses an out of date enterprise certificate for authentication to allow the jailbreak to take place. This means that you need to change the date and time on your iPhone or iPad to June 2nd, 2014 otherwise the jailbreak will not work.

Step 6 – Set the date and time to June 2nd 2014.

Step 7 – Wait for Pangu to check the date is correct and then click the big black button to start the jailbreak and just wait.

Step 8 – As with Evad3rs a new app will appear on the springboard of your device.

Note: If you wait too long before tapping ‘Continue’ or ‘Quit’ a message in red text will appear. If this happens you must start the jailbreak process from the beginning again.

Step 9 – The Pangu app on the PC will continue to jailbreak the device – do not disconnect the device or unplug the device USB cable from your PC.

Step 10 – When the Pangu app looks like this on your PC the jailbreak is complete.

You can verify this also by looking on your device now and seeing the Cydia icon.

THAT’S IT

iOS 7.1.2 is jailbroken.

But what happens if you did all this but forgot to uncheck the checkbox? (If your pangu had the checkbox option)

How to disable 2PP if you have already jailbroken your iOS 7.1.2 device

You have two options:

1 – Restore your phone which will DELETE ALL DATA and rejailbreak the phone using the steps above.

2 – Remove PPSync to stop 2PP from functioning.

To do this, on the now jailbroken iOS 7.1.2 device, go to Cydia. Tap Sources > Manage > Edit > Add.

When asked for the repo name type in http://cydia.angelxwind.net/

Wait for Cydia to update and then tap the new source from the list.

Tap the program titled ‘Install Complete PPSync Remover’.

Run the app to remove the PPSync program from your device and it should be okay.

For those who are wondering PPSync, once installed, can cause device instability and stock apps (e.g. iBooks or Maps) to crash and it generally can affect the performance of your device.

So now you know how to jailbreak iOS 7.1.2 on a Windows PC using Pangu. If you have any questions or comments head over to the jailbreak page of Spy Phone Review which you can find here or leave a comment below.

For those who are not familiar with the world of gaming recently one of the most hotly anticipated titles dropped – Watch Dogs from Ubisoft. This open world sandbox game promised everything that the seminal GTA V offered except its focus was more on hacking the city in order to thwart enemies then relying just on firepower alone,

Watch Dogs takes place in a Chicago of the future where the entire city is hooked up to one main system known as CtOS. Obviously, those with any hacking knowledge could potentially hack in to the system and cause all kinds of chaos to the city and its inhabitants and that, essentially, is the crux of Watch Dogs.

Many people have already gone to task comparing just how plausible or possible the hacks are that you pull of as Aiden Pierce as you investigate who murdered your niece and this article is going to show you that parts of what you see and what you can do in the world of Watch Dogs is already very real and has been around now for quite some time.

The first thing is listening to live calls. At the start of Watch Dogs you happen to hack in to a bystanders phone and you can listen to the entire conversation on your own phone.

Call intercept allows you to listen in live to the phone calls of another person without the other person ever knowing you are there. Unlike Watch Dogs though which stretches the truth like all good Hollywood and TV to the point where you believe that anything can be hacked remotely (hint: it’s a lie) if you really want to listen to someone else’s phone calls using FlexiSPY you will of course need the TARGET device of the other person first so that you can physically install FlexiSPY on to it.

CALL RECORDING

During the course of Watch Dogs you uncover audio logs which are recordings that give more insight in to the lives of the people living in this futuristic version of Chicago. In the game Aiden simply hacks in to a computer and can then start listening to a stored audio log on his phone. The same principle is applied by FlexiRECORD with their FlexiRECORD product. Except in real life you need to first install the monitoring software, in this case FlexiSPY, on to the TARGET device and FlexiRECORD on to your own computer and connected Android phone.

After that it works the same way, all calls can be recorded and stored on your computer or you can save the recorded files to your phone to listen to them on the move.

Not only can you listen to live calls in Watch Dogs but you can also be privy to private conversations between Chicago’s inhabitants as you walk around. FlexiSPY also has this feature in real life – known as spy call – and it allows you to use your own phone to call the TARGET device and listen to what it taking place around the phone at the time you call.

FlexiSPY makes spycall incredibly simple, once you have installed FlexiSPY on to the TARGET phone you simply enter your own mobile phone number in the FlexiSPY online dashboard, enable the spycall feature and then you are all set.

Simply call the TARGET phone from your own to start secretly listening in.

Watch Dogs is all about hacking at the end of the day. There is nothing more satisfying then hacking traffic lights to escape a police pursuit, looking back seeing the police smash in to the puzzled drivers as you speed away or watching them get impaled on blockers you activate. But did you know that Watch Dogs allows you to hack the SMS messages of people too? That’s right, and, yes, in real life it can be done too. So this means that, at certain points during the game, you can hack someone else’s SMS messages to learn revealing information or even send them SMS messages to distract them and get their attention whilst you sneak past.

Whilst technology is not at the point just yet of allowing you to hack someone else’s phone remotely (although many scams are out there) you can indeed intercept and read someone else’s SMS messages using FlexiSPY.

FLEXIRECORD

Or how about hacking a bridge to raise up after you have escaped? Watch Dogs allows you to do all that and Ubi Soft even had Kaspersky onboard as advisers to make sure that the hacking performed in the game was actually real (although a lot of it was made more dramatic for effect – think the hacking movie Swordfish with John Travolta and Hugh Jackman).

So there is no doubt that right now Watch Dogs is the hottest game on the planet. With its innovative take on an interactive and interconnected city and society it makes you think about your own security. We are all too reliant on our computers or smartphones and it will only get worse and this means the greater the risk that all we care about digitally can be hacked. There is a classic line in the 2001 Ryan Philippe hacking movie ‘Antitrust’ which goes: “We don’t take anything seriously, unless it’s on a hard drive”

This is truer today than it has ever been with our devices now literally becoming part of us (Galaxy Gear and Google Glass) with a whole host of wearable devices set to launch very soon. It is getting to the point that are bodies are our data which is why health apps are now the next big application market to plunder.

There is no doubt that the release of Watch Dogs has raised issues and questions about how secure we are online or when dealing with digital data and how dependent we have become on our devices and how much control they have over us (let’s get this straight, they control us, we do not control them otherwise we would just turn them off and never use them).

It is the constant need to check Twitter, Facebook, SMS messages, voice mail all the time that keeps our devices turned on and always in our thoughts. All of this data, in the wrong hands or obtained unethically could have very bad consequences. But first the media needs to educate itself about what hacking really is and what it truly involves instead of sensationalizing it for Hollywood and TV.

With the release of Watch Dogs it would have been nice to get away from the stereotypical way of showing hacking as being done remotely which is just not true. It is this misinformation that allows for many illegitimate companies to profit providing scam software. When you think about the story of Watch Dogs even placing an entire city under control by one OS (it would be several ones surely? One for each infrastructure type – water, power etc.) is a little radical but make no mistake, this is where our lives are going.

WHO KNOWS

Maybe Ubi Soft will fix this in the sequel and will make Aiden have to physically install the hacking software on to the device you want to hack first and for multiplayer teams of hackers could fight it out online for control of specific subsystems of the OS (like capture the flag) to beat the opposing team – it would make the game more interesting and more realistic – or at least they could allow us to hide all the dead bodies we leave in our wake.