Well, that was faster than expected. iPhone 3.0.1 was released by Apple today as a security update to the Apple iPhone operating system. The update fixes a bug that apparently the vast majority (if not all) GSM phones are susceptible to. In short, hackers could run unsigned code by sending a simple text message, and before the update, there was not a damn thing anyone could do about it.

More surprising is that Apple did not use this opportunity to step on the the tethering hack which a lot of us have been using. If you have an iPhone 3G or 3GS, you can enable tethering by simply changing a setting, and it’s really easy to do. Still, we all know how Apple pulls applications and functionality because of AT&T, so imagine my relief when I found that 3.0.1 keeps this little loophole intact. But my pessimism isn’t dead just yet. I expect that Apple will kill tethering by the time iPhone 3.1 rolls out.