Amid state sponsored attack row on IPhones, Apple says may be false alarm

Amid outrage over the alleged alert of “state sponsored hacking” attempt on Apple phones of several of the Opposition MPs in India, the IPhone maker on Tuesday clarified that “it does not attribute the threat notifications to any specific state-sponsored attacker”.

It also said that it’s possible that some Apple threat notifications may be false alarms.

The IPhone maker, in a statement, said: “State-sponsored attackers are very well-funded and sophisticated, and their attacks evolve over time”.

“Detecting such attacks relies on threat intelligence signals that are often imperfect and incomplete. It’s possible that some Apple threat notifications may be false alarms, or that some attacks are not detected,” it said.

“We are unable to provide information about what causes us to issue threat notifications, as that may help state-sponsored attackers adapt their behavior to evade detection in the future,” it added.

It further said that Apple has sent “threat notifications” to individuals whose accounts are in nearly 150 countries. The response from the US-based Apple came hours after several Opposition MPs and leaders claimed to have received a notification from Apple stating that their devices could be targetted by “state-sponsored attackers”.

Opposition MPs, including Shiv Sena (UBT) Priyanka Chaturvedi, Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra, Congress’ Pawan Khera and Shashi Tharoor, AAP’s Raghav Chadha, CPI(M)’s Sitaram Yechuriy Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav and said that they have received a notification from Apple stating that their devices were being targetted by state-sponsored attackers.

Meanwhile, former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday slammed the Centre saying that many of his office members, party leaders, Opposition leaders have received alerts on alleged attempts to hack their Apple devices.

He also said that this bid to hack the phones of political leaders was the “act of criminals and thieves and not of an honest person, but we are not scared.”