iOS 9 has hit a million downloads, since everyone has enthusiastically been updating to the new firmware right from the moment it was launched a few days ago. For this reason, security researchers are ready to pay huge amount of money to those who can find out security flaws in the firmware.
Zerodium is an exploit trader and has offered a million-dollar bounty to anyone who can uncover any new exploits in iOS 9. Such flaws would enable a hacker to take hold of a non-jailbroken iOS 9 device via a text message, an in-app browsing action, or through a web page. App Store manages software downloads very tightly, so it is very difficult to find such flaws on iOS devices. However, is is not impossible, looking at the recent XcodeGhost malware attack.
Those who want to claim the million-dollar bounty will have to make it fast, as the time limit is very strict. For qualifying into the competition, the hacker needs to offer a complete chain of undisclosed exploits that can avoid each and every aspect of the exploit mitigation measures of Apple and can be executed entirely, silently, and remotely through a text message or browser.
All the researchers will have to submit their entries by October 31. Less than 2 months to come up with iOS 9 exploits are too less, especially if you are someone who does not have an iOS developer credential, and the bounty might go unclaimed. However, the price tag will invite many researchers for sure.