The government on Tuesday said that it will investigate the notifications sent by Apple to several people, including at least seven opposition leaders, that their iPhones may have been targeted by state-sponsored attackers. The government also asked Apple to cooperate with the investigation and provide accurate information on the alleged attacks.
The IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said in a series of posts on X, formerly Twitter, that the government is committed to protecting the privacy and security of all citizens and will get to the bottom of these notifications. He made this announcement after a media interaction in Bhopal, where he dismissed the accusation of the opposition leaders that the government was spying on them.
He also said that there are many compulsive critics in the country who criticise the government at every opportunity. Further, based on certain estimations, he called the advisory issued by Apple, vague and speculative. He highlighted that Apple has confirmed the robustness of their encryption system and noted that such advisories have been issued across 150 countries.
The minister of state for IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar also posted on X that the government will investigate these “threat notifications” as well as Apple’s “claims of being secure and privacy compliant devices”. He questioned Apple’s claims of designing privacy-preserving products and said that the government expects Apple to clarify “if its devices are secure” and why these notifications “are sent to people in over 150 countries”.
It is important to note that the advisory has been sent by Apple to people in 150 countries since this notification system was introduced in November 2021, not just last night. Also, sending prompt warnings to users of attempts to compromise their devices or accounts is a desirable feature in a secure product and service.
Among the seven opposition leaders who received the alerts from Apple on Monday were Congress’s Shashi Tharoor, TMC’s Mahua Moitra, and AAP’s Raghav Chadha among others. Multiple journalists also received this alert. In a statement to HT, Apple said, “Apple does not attribute the threat notifications to any specific state-sponsored attacker.”
The company also reiterated that it was possible that some Apple threat notifications may be false alarms, or that some attacks are not detected.
