The Indian Express (Delhi Edition)
Mehbooba’s daughter among Apple users in 98 countries to receive alert on ‘ mercenary spyware’
ILTIJA MUFTI, the daughter of former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, Wednesday said she had received an Apple threat notification saying her iphone could have been attacked by “mercenary spyware”, such as the NSO Group’s Pegasus.
“Got an Apple alert that my phone’s been hacked by Pegasus which GOI has admittedly procured & weaponised to harass critics & political opponents...” Iltija Mufti said in a post on social media platform X.
“I have not received such an alert before, never to my knowledge,” she told The Indian Express.
“I know GOI, especially BJP’S top brass, has a history of intimidating rivals and silencing dissenters and opponents by hacking into their phones. Snooping around on women is a new low. I’m shocked they’ve attempted to hack into my phone to intercept my personal information,” she alleged.
Apart from Mufti, Pushparaj Deshpande, founder of the Delhi- based Samruddha Bharat Foundation also claimed to have received a similar notification from Apple. The foundation works with stakeholders including the INDIA bloc parties.
Deshpande, who says he also represents Congress as a spokesperson in TV debates, told The Indian Express: “I am assuming this is an escalation of what my organisation has been facing for a while. If this is sanctioned by state actors, this is a structural assault on all progressives safeguarding India’s soul.”
A source aware of Apple’s threat notifications said that the alerts were sent as part of the company’s quarterly update process, and users in 98 countries, including India, received them. The number of Indian iphone users who may have been affected is unclear.
Apple did not respond to a request for comment.
It is also unclear when exactly the attack may have taken place since Apple sends these alerts every quarter. It is possible some people’s iphones may have been affected for several months before they learn about it at the end of a quarter from Apple.
In April, Apple had updated its threat notification policy, which was seen by many as a dilution of its earlier policy. A key change Apple had then made was removing language which said a user’s iphone may have been targeted by a “potential state- sponsored spyware attack” and attributing attacks to “mercenary spyware” instead.
Last October, the company had sent threat notifications to Opposition leaders — including Congress’s Shashi Tharoor, AAP’S Raghav Chadha and TMC’S Mahua Moitra — warning of a “potential state- sponsored spyware attack” on their iphones.
The notifications sent to Mufti and Deshpande reflect the changed “mercenary spyware” threat. “Apple detected that you are being targeted by a mercenary spyware attack that is trying to remotely compromise the iphone associated with your Apple ID... This attack is likely targeting you specifically because of who you are or what you do. Although it’s never possible to achieve absolute certainty when detecting such attacks, Apple has high confidence in this warning — please take it seriously,” reads the Apple email. “Mercenary spyware attacks, such as those using Pegasus from the NSO Group, are exceptionally rare and vastly more sophisticated than regular cybercriminal activity or consumer malware...”
Apple started sending these threat notifications in 2021, and since then individuals in 150 countries have received them. When it had sent the notification last year, at least 20 Indians with iphones had received them.