iOS 27.2 has a sandbox escape now. It is public, it is open source, and it was published on GitHub on November 8 by researcher forcequitOS, working with @0xjohnny. It lets one app read the data containers of other apps, which is exactly what the iOS sandbox is supposed to prevent. Two days later, a blockchain security firm warned crypto wallet users about it, and a file manager built on it is already out. The author is blunt about one thing, though: this is not a jailbreak, and it never will be.
The project is called worse_query, and it is the direct successor to bad_query, an earlier sandbox escape from the same line of research. Its README lists iOS 26.0 through 26.7.2 and iOS 27.2 as the affected versions. By the morning of November 10 it had 378 stars and 71 forks on GitHub, up from 143 stars in its first 12 hours. That is fast growth for a developer tool that, by its own description, is not useful on its own.
What worse_query can reach
The sandbox is the wall iOS puts between apps. A normal app can read its own files and almost nothing else. worse_query gets around that wall by redirecting a cache folder inside an app-controlled shared container, then requesting a file-access permission token through iOS’s container-management service. The trick needs an App Group container set up in the app first, which is why the author calls it a proof of concept for developers rather than a tool for ordinary users.
Once it runs, the README says it can reach app-data containers and shared app-group containers, plus certain system containers on iOS 27. The listed paths include /var/containers/Data/System and /var/containers/Shared/SystemGroup/* on iOS 27, along with /var/mobile/Containers/Data/Application/*, InternalDaemon and PluginKitPlugin containers, and the Shared/AppGroup trees. In plain terms, a malicious app built on this code could read files that belong to other apps installed on the same phone.
That is a real break in a core iOS security boundary, and it is also a narrow one. The escape gives file access, not kernel access and not root. It cannot install tweaks, it cannot bypass the App Store, and it cannot jailbreak a phone. The author put that in bold in the README: “This is not relevant to a jailbreak and never will be. Please don’t mislead people into believing otherwise.” Anyone selling an iOS 27.2 jailbreak download and pointing at worse_query as proof is misrepresenting it, and we have explained how to spot those offers.
SlowMist’s wallet warning
The reason this moved from a research release to a news story today is a warning from SlowMist, the blockchain security firm. Its chief information security officer, 23pds, posted on X on November 10 that worse_query is a container sandbox escape, not a jailbreak, and that it breaks the assumption that apps cannot access one another’s data containers.
The warning is specific about who should care. The flaw does not steal assets by itself. The risk appears if a user installs and runs an IPA file from an untrusted source, and that app uses the escape. Wallets that store a seed phrase, a keystore file, or a WebView cache in plaintext on the device could then have that data read. His advice was to update to the latest system version and to avoid installing apps from untrusted sources.
That advice is worth taking seriously, and it is worth reading precisely. Reputable wallets encrypt secrets at rest, so the warning bites hardest for wallets that keep sensitive data in plaintext. The point is not that every iPhone with a wallet app is exposed. It is that the sandbox, the layer users assume protects one app from another, has a public hole in it on the current iOS, and the hole is now packaged in code anyone can download.
WQFiles turns the proof of concept into a file manager
The second sign that worse_query is more than a README came on November 9, when developer Kolbicz released WQFiles, a file browser, app data manager and cache cleaner for iOS 27 built on the escape. No jailbreak is required to run it. It is the first real tool built on worse_query, and it shows the practical shape of the flaw: a sideloaded app that can browse and manage files outside its own container, on a stock phone, on the newest iOS.
That is also what makes the story useful rather than alarming. WQFiles is a legitimate use of the same technique, and it shows what the escape can do without any malicious intent. The same file access in a different app, installed from a different source, is the risk SlowMist is warning about. The code does not decide which one it is. The source of the app does.
iOS 27.2.1 does not list a fix
Apple released iOS 27.2.1 on November 9, with nine security fixes covering Messages, Bluetooth, AirPlay and more. Neither the iOS 27.2.1 advisory nor the matching iOS 26.7.3 advisory identifies worse_query or confirms a fix for it, so installing the update does not establish that the escape is blocked. Updating is still the right move, since 27.2.1 closes nine other flaws, but it is not a confirmed answer to this one.
This is a familiar pattern in this line of research. Johnny’s earlier AirTraffic sandbox escape, Airlift, was patched by Apple in iOS 27.2 beta 3. bad_query came after it, and worse_query now replaces bad_query. Each round gets published, Apple closes it in a later release, and the next version appears. The disclosure cycle is working as designed. The gap between publication and patch is the window that matters, and right now that window is open.
Where this sits in the iOS 27 story
worse_query is not part of Calif’s jailbreak chain, and it should not be confused with it. Calif’s kernel exploit code and writeup, promised for around November 10, had still not appeared on the team’s blog as of this morning. The first public jailbreak environment for iOS 27.2, doublera1n, arrived on November 8 from a Calif researcher, but it runs on an iPhone 11 Pro through a boot ROM flaw and a hardware board, a completely different route. worse_query is the third thread in the same week: not a jailbreak, but a reminder that iOS 27.2 has more than one public hole in it.
For most iPhone owners, the practical advice is short. Do not install IPA files from sources you do not trust, and do not sideload apps from links in messages or videos promising a jailbreak. Install iOS 27.2.1 for the nine flaws it does fix. And if you use a crypto wallet, check that it encrypts its secrets rather than storing them in plaintext, because the sandbox is no longer the guarantee it was. Calif’s writeup is still the release the jailbreak community is waiting for, and when it lands, the picture for iOS 27 will change again. Until then, worse_query is the development that actually shipped.
