Exploit discovered that could allow A5 devices to downgrade from iOS 5.1

Folks with newer devices on iOS 5.1 will be happy to hear that

iH8sn0w has uncovered a new exploit that could potentially allow users to downgrade their A5 gadgets to the more jailbreak-friendly iOS 5.0.1 in the near future.

As noted by Gadgetsteria, the Sn0wBreeze creator announced yesterday via his Twitter account that he has uncovered a “loophole” in Apple’s APticket system that allowed him to downgrade his iPad 2 from 5.1 to 5.0.1…

Here’s the tweet:

iH8sn0w@iH8sn0w

Found a loophole in Apple's apticket system. Restored my iPad 2 to 5.0.1 from 5.1. Works on all A5 devices. :)

25 Mar 12

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This is actually a pretty big deal, considering there isn’t currently a jailbreak available for A5 devices (untethered or otherwise) on iOS 5.1. Nor is there a method of downgrading the firmware on these devices at this time.

Chances are you’ll need saved SHSH blobs from iOS 5.0.1 for whatever hardware you’re looking to downgrade, but we won’t know anything for sure until we see an official release. And unfortunately, we don’t have any kind of ETA.

As always, we’ll let you know more as soon as we do. So stay tuned.