An developer has reverse-engineered how the iPhone 4S talks to the Siri servers, and has successfully sent requests from a non-iPhone device. In case you don’t know, Siri works by using a three-steps methods: 1/voice recording (on the phone) 2/voice recognition (on a server) 3/ taking action (on the phone).
Because the smartness is on a web server, requests could be sent from any web-enabled device. Of course, we’ve known all along that limiting Siri to the iPhone 4S is completely artificial, but what does this really mean for you?Put simply, this means that there’s a remote chance that jailbroken devices may be able to use Siri. In fact, all devices could use Siri. Now, it’s not that easy: at this point, Apple seems to only check for the device unique ID. However, in the future, they could come up with a much stronger key that could mix IDs from two pieces of hardware and some kind of encryption.
This is a cat and mouse game that is probably going to continue for some time, but Apple has the means to plug holes fairly quickly, for now. Check our iPhone 4S review if you want to check what Siri is capable of. If you’re a Mac user, it look like Mac computer may officially get Siri soon. [more info: Applidium]
Filed in . Read more about Developer, Development, Hacking and Siri.