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If Apple had known at that point, they would have already closed the exploit.
Good point, I assume a lot vulnerabilities are zero day, to fix them without degrading productivity you need to change architecture level. When last time appple fundamentally change OS? Is there way for business at Apple to waste time on things that don’t give them obvious ways to get profit?
 
Funny that Apple knows that the attackers are "state-sponsored" 😏
That bit, or in fact any bit of this warning apart maybe from the fairly generic advice about updatin, might not originate from Apple. It’s even possible that the detection of the malicious activity happened elsewhere, maybe the NSA, and Apple is simply the obvious communication channel through which to send the warning. Even if it was Apple’s systems that initially detected the suspicious activity (and my guess is that was the case) I would be very surprised if Apple hadn’t consulted with one or more government agencies such as the NSA before adding that “state-sponsored” attribution.
 
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There was a time when the spyware makers only sold to states, which is probably why Apple called it state-sponsored.

The situation is worse now. There's a whole spyware industry selling to anyone with lots of cash. Which is possibly why Apple have changed the wording.
 
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Disgusting. Marketing and publishing articles how it does not share data to entities. Which is a collaboration to manipulate the minds of customers, whole in the meanwhile hardware backdoors have been implemented in the iPhones (which was recently discovered) during X-Ray and data scans.

Probably some leaks that got out and this is damage control.
 
That bit, or in fact any bit of this warning apart maybe from the fairly generic advice about updatin, might not originate from Apple. It’s even possible that the detection of the malicious activity happened elsewhere, maybe the NSA, and Apple is simply the obvious communication channel through which to send the warning. Even if it was Apple’s systems that initially detected the suspicious activity (and my guess is that was the case) I would be very surprised if Apple hadn’t consulted with one or more government agencies such as the NSA before adding that “state-sponsored” attribution.

India actually "asked" / forced them to change the wording to "mercenary" in the latest notification. It is mentioned in the article on Reuters.
 
I use imazing to check for these, doing so actually found Pegasus on a friends iPhone a few years ago.

I am guessing these kind of "warnings" can be ignored? got 18 of those

'AppDomain-com.ingka.ikea.app/Library/WebKit/WebsiteData/ResourceLoadStatistics/observations.db' cannot be parsed (no such table: ObservedDomains).
 
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I wonder if this will lead to an uptick of people asking for help in tech support forums, and saying that the reason their devices are acting up is because they're the victim of a "mercenary spyware attack."

...as opposed to them just being, you know... kind of incompetent with technology. Nah, it's clearly those darned mercenaries at fault! 😤
 
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Am I glad I switched to the Samsung S24 and gave up using an iPhone.

My iPhone got badly hacked by that Israeli software 6 months ago. I real nightmare. Had to throw the phone out it was so badly hacked.

Seems nowadays iPhones get targeted with spyware even worse than Android.
Yep, in spite of Apple marketing, Apple devices are only marginally better than Android with security.

At least with Android, anyone in the know can lock down their phone because they have access to the firewall and other security software. With Apple devices you don't have access or control. I hope you all know that Apple allows certain types of connections, which are undocumented, to bypass the iPhone firewall.

Sure mom and pop off the street are likely to get hosed with Android, but once you realize that Apple has to provide backdoors that governments demand or lose sales then it all becomes clear what a farce Apple's security really is.
 
Apple on Wednesday sent threat notifications to users in 92 countries warning that they may have been targeted by mercenary spyware attacks, likely because of who they are or what they do.

In an updated support document, Apple said it has sent similar threat notifications to users in over 150 countries since 2021.
Spyware attacks? It must be due to the questionable apps these people are getting from alternative app stores. If you stick to getting apps only from Apple's App Store, Apple guarantees your iPhone will be secure and your privacy safe. Or so I've been told. ;)


Pegasus needs a delivery system to infect an iphone so it begs the question what delivery system is being used? is it email?, a website? an imessage?
Alternative app stores :p
 
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Reactions: iOS Geek
Rats. Now I have to look up the word "mercenary"? I guess Apple didn't want to offend any attacking state sponsors.
 
Am I glad I switched to the Samsung S24 and gave up using an iPhone.

My iPhone got badly hacked by that Israeli software 6 months ago. I real nightmare. Had to throw the phone out it was so badly hacked.

Seems nowadays iPhones get targeted with spyware even worse than Android.

Nah... as with Microsoft Windows, everyone finds this quite normal these days, keep on rebooting and accept daily (if not hourly) updates of the anti-this&that software on their devices. 🤡

The reason I've switched to Mac 24 years ago and always have used an ISP that doesn't sell your data.

To prevent most problems, use totally different passwords everywhere. Stay away from free internet services like Hotmail, Facebook. And don't send sensitive information like passwords on chatting services.
 
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Worried about security? Download this app you've never heard of and give it unfettered access to your Mac and iPhone! /s (sort of)

That is funny, but it is legit. It is good advice though as DHD essentially says to verify that a tool is real and not the spyware itself

See, e.g.:


imazing reportedly uses the MVT to do the scan:
 
I guess it's odd that I feel left out that i didn't get this message... Obviously not enough of a "who" or "what" I do isn't important enough to get targeted.... Sigh! Back to my mundane nobody life i go... 😅
 
Am I glad I switched to the Samsung S24 and gave up using an iPhone.

My iPhone got badly hacked by that Israeli software 6 months ago. I real nightmare. Had to throw the phone out it was so badly hacked.

Seems nowadays iPhones get targeted with spyware even worse than Android.
🤣 most probably "they" have full access already to your S24, doesn't need to be targeted...
 
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Two things:

1) if i had received all of those alerts, I would have ignored them as....an attack.
2) I will never be a target bc I'm a nobody who sometimes goes to the store and eats meals.
 
Crickey. If--*IF*--Apple would implement a firewall in iOS that blocks data by newly installed software by default, this wouldn't be such a big issue. Hail, I set my Android phone's firewall to block wifi and celluar by default. I have to allow access via AFW+ before the app can have network access.

I can't believe folks to claim security and privacy is a primary concern isn't demanding Apple build a firewall into iOS. Come on, man. Y'all are connected to a network 24/7 without the most basic protection.😩
 
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