iPhone Backup Extractor 5
release notes

We're really excited to be shipping another first in today's release of iPhone Backup Extractor: support for iCloud Photo Stream. We hope you enjoy it -- it's free to all existing licensees with iCloud access.

As befits a big new feature like this, it marks the end of our 5.x releases, and we'll ship iPhone Backup Extractor 6 shortly after this. See you there!

• Feature Support for downloading all of your iCloud Photo Stream content.
• Fix We've handled a few crashes in the app.
• Fix When an iCloud account is removed, the app is now better at showing when nothing is selected.

• Improvement We've made more changes to the licensing windows on macOS.
• Fix We've resolved a broken with the update window: it was broken previously.
• Fix We've corrected a typo under the Utilities menu on macOS.

• Feature We've updated the macOS version of iPhone Backup Extractor with the changes to licenses descriptions that we made in 5.8.6.574.

• Feature We now describe the benefits of licensing differently for Windows users of the app. Not everyone will see this change: if you're not one of them, don't worry about it. It'll appear over time.
• Improvement We show interactive content in the app using a new component. We think it's better. How are they looking to you?

• Improvement macOS handles iCloud user experience better for users who have forgotten their passwords.
• Improvement Windows is now even smarter when it comes to searching for backups.
• Improvement iCloud login can now be cancelled before it completes.
• Improvement 2FA interface improvements.
• Fix Fixed an issue where things could hang in unusual cases when removing an iCloud account.
• Fix macOS download button for iCloud backups is now disabled when it should be.
• Fix We handle a curious Microsoft error (1316 Specific user already exists), affecting our installer. It's caused by a Windows hotfix which very few people have.
• Fix Improved how we manage categories for download on iCloud accounts.
• Fix Preventing the iCloud login popup from popping up when it shouldn't.

• Feature Hey! Guess who can now extract attachments from Kik, WeChat and Viber? It's you. Us. iPhone Backup Extractor.
• Feature HTML exports from Kik, WeChat, Viber and Snapchat are now a thing.
• Feature Support for Notes on iOS 9. Happy day!
• Improvement Added a right-click menu item in "Export mode" to view Plists
• Improvement Plist file viewer shows the original file's path.
• Improvement We've made a few text tweaks in the app.
• Fix Lots of iCloud account management fixes. Preferences window didn't always acknowledge a newly-added account. iCloud backups are now selected after being downloaded. iCloud accounts weren't always removed after logging out.
• Fix Clear category selection after switching iCloud backups.
• Fix Viewing Plists in encrypted backups had been broken, but it's fixed now. Sorry.
• Fix The "Loading backups" message had an issue, and we resolved it.
• Fix Some of our analytics tracking wasn't working properly in every case.
• Fix We've resolved an issue loading some forms of corrupted MBDB files.
• Fix We've made a few minor improvements to how things work on macOS 10.7.
• Fix Disabled Kik stickers until it is possible to interpret them.
• Fix Improvements to how we handle connection of devices over USB on macOS. This is probably not something you'll be seeing, though.
• Fix Prevented curious Snapchat references to non-existent files causing a manifest issue and crash.
• Fix Resolved an annoying edge-case when activating or deactivating a license.

• Improvement We've made a series of improvements to our undeletion technology across the board. This'll affect messages and notes in particular.
• Improvement We now show a "loading" message whilst App View is loading.
• Improvement If no thumbnails are available for SMS previews, we generate them.
• Improvement We've added icons for available data categories from the icon.
• Improvement Hi-DPI support on Windows is improved for bonkers edge-case with multiple screens with different DPI settings
• Improvement A number of cosmetic fixes around the iCloud and Preferences interfaces.
• Fix We fixed note undeletion for iOS 9.
• Fix We accidentally broke support for iOS 5 SMS recovery in an earlier build, but now it has been restored.
• Fix There used to be a crash reading some Plists from Snapchat. We've solved that now.
• Fix Duplicate recovered deleted SMS messages are no longer shown.
• Fix Fixed an issue saving out WeChat messages where a user was missing.
• Fix Resolved a problem whereby the "available data" shown wasn't updated when a backup was modified (and we fixed a rare crash on backup modification.)
• Fix Better handling of date and timestamps in call history and notes around the world
• Fix Added more options for recovery of WhatsApp data to the converstion menu,.
• Fix Fixed play button alignment for WhatsApp video thumbnails.

We're really excited to ship more new features today: support for recovery of Snapchat, Kik, Viber and WeChat messages. We'll add support for their attachments in a build to follow.

• Feature Support for Snapchat message extraction.
• Feature Support for WeChat message extraction.
• Feature Support for Viber message extraction.
• Feature Support for Kik message extraction.

We've included a lot of user interface enhancements in this release.

• Improvement First-time user experience for adding an iCloud account has been improved.
• Improvement It's now possible to expand and collapse groups of devices in the left-hand navigation.
• Improvement The message shown after extracting data is now clearer.
• Improvement Handfuls of text, capitalisation, font, graphics, Hi-DPI and alignment tweaks.
• Improvement Preferences now available from the app's menu (and it can no longer be maxmised).
• Improvement Default device shown if no backups are present is now the latest model of device -- the iPhone 6 -- rather than the old iPad which was shown before.
• Fix Our iCloud account access tooltip's yellow has been corrected -- and the tooltip is back on Windows. It always was there on Mac.
• Fix The main window can no longer be made unusably small.
• Fix Duplicate entries on the file menu have been removed.

We're starting to test a change to how we show our upgrade prompt on Windows. Some of our users will see this updated build, but not all will. Don't worry if you don't see it: it's functionality the same as before, apart from that prompt.

• Improvement Updated upgrade prompt.

This is a Mac-only update for the behind-the-scenes changes we included for Windows in the last release we made (5.8.2.429).

• Improvement We've included some behind-the-scenes stuff improving how we manage backup data in general.

Nine days ago we shipped our new interface for Mac users, and now it's arrived for Windows. Hurrah!

• Feature Brand new interface, better suited for working with multiple backups and iCloud accounts. There's a new left-hand navigation control, and all that other good stuff.
• Improvement We've included some behind-the-scenes stuff improving how we manage backup data in general.

This is a minor update for Mac users.

• Fix We've disabled the "restore" button in Export Mode. It shouldn't have been there!

Today's release is just for Mac users, with a handful of fixes and a handy new feature.

• Feature iPhone Backup Extractor will now show when your iOS device is connected via a cable or Wi-Fi, and tell you a little about it. It's not just about backups!
• Fix We've fixed a few issues that users were reporting, with one crash and a bug parsing data.
• Fix We've fixed an issue where the default backup folder path is actually a file. Who'd have thunk it?
• Fix We've fixed some issues loading messages and grouping backups.

OMG! Today's release is a massive step forward for Mac users. We felt bad about the delay in releasing iCloud functionality on macOS last year, so we've really upped our game on macOS as a consequence. We're really a brand-new, extra-spiffy UI for Mac users today. Windows users might be jealous.

Backup navigation is now on the left-hand side of the app, and there's a new "Preferences" window. Backups can be searched for in multiple locations, and it's possible to add multiple iCloud accounts at a time. It's also possible to securely store your iCloud password in your Mac's keychain.

• Feature Major interface overhaul for the Mac edition of iPhone Backup Extractor. We've got a new video which shows off some of the changes we've made.
• Feature Enabled support for multiple iCloud accounts.
• Feature Enabled support for additional backup search paths.
• Feature Users can now choose to save their iCloud passwords securely in their Mac's keychain.

Of all the things, some dodgy antivirus programs didn't like our Windows uninstaller. Why the uninstaller? Who knows. But to address the issue, we've replaced it.

• Improvement Completely new installer and uninstallation system. Works like the old one, but uses a different framework. If you're interested in the technical details, we now use the MSI format. This can be a little slower, but it's what Microsoft recommend.

• Fix We thought we'd nailed it last time, but in this release we've properly fixed timestamps for extracted call logs.
• Fix Messages between contacts with Unicode (or "special") characters in their names are now properly extracted.
• Fix Directories with dots in them are now displayed properly in Export Mode.
• Fix The file count for videos on App View wasn't right. Now it is.
• Fix We fixed a weird graphical issue where the App View tab's icons were overwriting each other.

Today's release sees us sending out a variety of fixes and improvements to iCloud and contacts data -- and more.

• Improvement We retry failed iCloud downloads more often.
• Fix We've fixed a potential overflow issue when downloading iCloud backups.
• Fix We've fixed a potential error when renaming paths.
• Fix The cancel download button didn't always work if pressed very early on. Now it does. Cancel away.
• Fix For some odd reason, we'd mixed up videos and recordings in App View. Now they're unmixed. As they should be.
• Fix We had a sneaky little issue with call history timestamps on iOS 8. It's fixed now.
• Fix We've resolved an issue with ordering of the country and post/ZIP code in vCard export.
• Fix We've made a variety of reliability improvements to iCloud downloads.

This is a maintenance build that tweaks a few ways we build iPhone Backup Extractor. There's little impact for users, although we've added a feature for Mac users.

• Feature The path rename window is now available on macOS: this is needed much less often on macOS, but if you run into a path that's too long to extract, it'll let you gracefully rename it.

• Fix We've improved the effectiveness of the iCloud download bar.
• Fix We now disable the "Download" button if now files or categories are selected for download.
• Fix Made a few cosmetic improvements to the Mac interface.

We've learned a whole lot of things since we shipped the new native macOS interface last month, and today we're making a number of internal changes to reflect that. You don't see much difference, although you might take our word for it that things are better. Oh, and we restored compatibility with OS X 10.7.

• Fix macOS 10.7 compatibility restored.

• Improvement We've reduced the time taken during "contacting servers" when using iCloud.
• Fix We've improved compatibility of the vCard files that iPhone Backup Extractor generates.
• Fix A bug has been squashed where SMS message times where shown in GMT for some users when being exported to HTML.
• Fix We've made a number of minor iCloud improvements.

Today's release is a big one for the Mac, as we're using a new native technology for the macOS interface. Everything should look crisper and be more responsive. Happy days.

• Feature iPhone Backup Extractor's Mac interface is now fully native.

This a minor update to improve our logging and speed up the process of selecting iCloud backups from the account list.

• Fix Selection of iCloud backups now has less interface lag.

Someday -- years in the future -- your grandchildren will ask you what you were doing when iPhone Backup Extractor 5.6.0.268 was released. "Why, young'un", you'll say, "I was on reincubate.com, reading their change-logs, and I was one of the first users to try it out." You'll thank us later.

• Improvement We've made a handful of iCloud backup download reliability improvements. We really have. Loads of stuff should be better -- and faster.

• Feature Sometimes when extracting files we find that a filename that works on your iPhone is too long to work on your PC. Windows, we're looking at you. We've now got a popup message that'll tell you this, and let you rename the file as a consequence.
• Improvement Problems with the iCloud download process are now reported more clearly to users.
• Improvement We now look in more places for WhatsApp data.
• Improvement We've continued to refactor quite a lot of things behind the scenes.
• Fix We've put another potential "out of memory" error to bed.
• Fix We've fixed an error that could pop up when seeing the license notification window for parental restrictions passcode recovery.

Today marks another milestone for us: releasing our iCloud functionality for macOS users. Previously, Windows users got all the fun (as it were) back in 4.9.70.0 when we shipped and polished this for them back in August. As of today, both Windows and Mac users are in parity. Other than in exceptional cases, we're aiming to maintain feature parity between both Windows and macOS in future releases. We love them both.

• Feature iCloud backup is now available for Mac users. Rejoice!

We're warming up to ship some particularly exciting new stuff in iPhone Backup Extractor, and today's release prepares us better to do that. Let's see what happens!

• Improvement We've made a behind-the-scenes change to prepare us for trying out some new functionality.

• Improvement Password entry for encrypted backups should be faster.
• Improvement We've improved the analytical data that our installer collects on its performance.
• Improvement We've also improved vCard extraction to CSV, cleaning up how we show phone number and address types.
• Fix Sometimes you'd see the year 1901 in an export of data. We actually meant there's no date available fo r that data. Now we do this properly, by leaving the field empty.
• Fix We've squashed a Unicode issue with contacts on Windows.
• Fix Extracted files without extensions no longer end with a . once extracted. Windows hates this.
• Fix We've fixed a potential race condition whilst recovering a parental restrictions passcode.
• Fix We now handle when users try to login with dodgy characters in their username, like semicolons.

• Fix Corrupted encrypted backups which are missing their keybags now don't lead to a crash. Instead there's a message explaining what's up.
• Fix Non-Latin filenames are now normalised into equivalent Latin characters instead of _ symbols when being extracted to non-Unicode filesystems.
• Fix We've resolved an "out of memory" crash that could occur during an iCloud backup download.

• Improvement We've made a minor change to our licensing system in this release.

This release contains an update for SMS attachment extraction from iOS 8.

• Fix SMS attachments are all sorted out on iOS 8.

Today's release is a minor update to fix two different types of crash that could occur.

• Fix Fixed a crash that could occur when switching between encrypted backups.
• Fix Fixed a crash that could be triggered by the app view. Oops.

As we continue to build on our iCloud access technology, we're making quite a few changes in the application behind the scenes. This release has a lot of those changes. Like polar bears in snowstorms, you might not see them, but they're there.

• Improvement Piles of changes in the core of the app, enhancing debugging, testing, logging. We've even changed how we use fonts.
• Fix We've squashed a few other bugs that cropped up with call history handling on iOS 8.

Oh my word! It seems we're shipping new features with every release of iPhone Backup Extractor at the moment. What have we got today? Let's see:

• Feature Support for two-factor authentication when logging into iCloud. Even though Apple aren't really pushing it, we're massive fans of 2FA, and we think you should enable it. Also, we don't think anyone else does this yet. That's pretty neat.
• Improvement We've reduced the complexity of our code for processing download links, and things should be faster now. Also, we'll tell you what's up in more detail if it goes wrong.
• Fix We ran into and solved some iOS 8 issues, and have since fixed deleted message recovery and calendar extraction. Apologies for the inconvenience.
• Fix Some "Pro" users who activated offline would see a "Home" screen when using iCloud. That shouldn't. And it's sorted now.

• Improvement Support for extraction of WhatsApp group messages has been added.
• Improvement We've added support for iOS 9 calendar extraction.
• Improvement WhatsApp message sender names are now shown.
• Improvement We've also added icons for audio files in all attachment shown in exports. With a "play" button, too.
• Improvement Message exports are now shown looking more like an iPhone or iPad would show them.
• Fix We've solved a crash issue when extracting call history from iOS 9 backups.
• Fix The app prints less console output when run on macOS.
• Fix We've resolved a crash problem that could happen when a user has no browser configured, but wants to open a linked attachment in a message.
• Fix We've solved an issue where messages which lacked a body wouldn't be shown properly. We handle missing attachments much more cleanly in reports now, too.
• Fix iCloud errors weren't being correctly reported. It's easier for us to diagnose problems now.
• Fix Counts of extracted content wasn't always making sense.
• Fix Extracted Plist files weren't always being saved in the right place.
• Fix Contact birthdays weren't always being correctly parsed.

This is a minor cleanup build addressing a minor issue in the previous release.

It's time for another set of new features for iPhone Backup Extractor. We hope you like them. ❤️

• Feature Expert mode now lets you easily modify and delete files from a backup.
• Feature iCloud data can now be downloaded by categories. Messages? Sure!
• Improvement Lots and lots of internal changes to how we do things.
• Fix We've fixed a bug with how we handle empty iCloud backup snapshots.

We're releasing a series of updates and improvements to iCloud functionality today. iCloud users within iPhone Backup Extractor should see:

• Feature Partial downloads can now be resumed. That's neat, isn't it?
• Improvement Better multithreading of downloads. They'll be faster!
• Improvement Download progress is now shown more accurately. We're spoiling you today.
• Improvement We've improved a few parts of our internal analytics system.
• Fix We've resolved a nasty crash for users running hacked up versions of Windows. We don't know why you hack up your Windows installations, but we've got your backs now.

Would you believe it, but today we're shipping a fixing an error in our error handling. Before writing this, we all drew straws to see who'd have to write this, the most embarrassing of release notes. It's me. I'm sorry.

• Fix Fix for iCloud error reporting.
• Fix We'd slipped up with license definition for our "Home" edition. That's fixed now.

Today's release includes functionality to help us better track errors as they occur. This helps us help you. Everyone gets helped!

• Improvement Improved reporting of issues when working with iCloud.

iPhone Backup Extractor 5.1.5.0 is a fix roll-up for our iCloud backup access support.

• Fix Improvements to concurrency of downloads.
• Fix Resolved issue with incorrect download size check.

Today's release of iPhone Backup Extractor 5.1.0.0 includes improvements to iCloud functionality and SMS undeletion.

• Improvement Recovery of deleted SMS messages now separates recovered attachments as files rather than data URIs. Makes more sense to you? Makes more sense to us.
• Fix We've squashed an issue with filesize mismatch on iCloud downloads and dealt with a few more complex niceties.

We're continuing to build on our iCloud functionality. There's been a painstaking amount of R&D involved in this, and we won't write about all of the updates we make behind the scenes. However, we can talk about the following:

• Improvement We've replaced our iCloud download ETA with a percentage complete, with the intention being that it's clearer for users.
• Improvement Magical mystery iCloud robustness improvements.
• Improvement Users used to have to deactivate and reactivate for a new license or upgrade to take effect. No longer!

As promised, a day after of our final iPhone Backup Extractor 4 release, here's our first release of iPhone Backup Extractor 5. 🎉 This build includes a number of behind-the-scenes changes as we improve the new iCloud service for users, and improve our ability to diagnose issues that arise.

• Fix Changed "Starting Download" to "Contacting Servers" on the iCloud download pane, as it makes more sense to users.