Apple denies hacking thousands of iPhones in Russian spy plot, 1 June 2023

Apple has denied allegations that it helped US authorities spy on Russian iPhone users.

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB)...claimed it uncovered a US National Security Agency (NSA) operation which hacked several thousand iPhones using sophisticated surveillance software.

The US intelligence agency was allegedly able to use specifically-designed “software vulnerabilities” to infect Apple’s phones with previously unknown malware, according to Russia’s foreign ministry.

The FSB claimed the espionage operation targeted devices belonging to former Soviet Union members and Russian-based foreign diplomats, including those from Israel, China and NATO.

The successor to Russia’s Soviet-era KGB said that the plot showed “close cooperation” between Apple and the NSA, the US national security agency tasked with collecting and monitoring data.

The FSB said: “The company provides American intelligence agencies with a wide range of opportunities to monitor any persons of interest to the White House and their partners in anti-Russian activities, and their own citizens.”

Apple has denied these claims. The California-based tech giant said: “We have never worked with any government to insert a backdoor into any Apple product and never will”...

However, the FSB has provided no evidence that Apple cooperated with the NSA or had any awareness of its alleged spying plot.

Kaspersky Lab, a Moscow-based antivirus company, has since reported that an undisclosed number of workers’ iPhones were targeted in “an extremely complex, professionally targeted cyberattack”...