Russia accuses Apple of 'close cooperation' with US spy agencies

Russia accuses Apple of ‘close cooperation’ with US spy agencies in espionage plot to ‘hack thousands of iPhones with invisible iMessages’

• Russia’s Federal Security Service made the dramatic allegation on Thursday
• Accused Apple of working with spy agencies in massive espionage plot
• Apple firmly denies claim it allowed any government backdoor access 

Russian security services have accused Apple of cooperating with US espionage agencies in a plot to hack iPhones using ‘invisible iMessages’ carrying spyware.  

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed on Thursday it had uncovered an American espionage operation that compromised thousands of iPhones using sophisticated surveillance software.

‘The FSB has uncovered an intelligence action of the American special services using Apple mobile devices,’ the FSB said in a statement.

The FSB claimed the plot showed ‘close cooperation’ between Apple and the National Security Agency (NSA), the US agency responsible for cryptographic and communications intelligence and security. 

The FSB provided no evidence that Apple cooperated with, or had any awareness of, the alleged spying campaign targeting its devices.

In a statement, Apple firmly denied the allegation, saying: ‘We have never worked with any government to insert a backdoor into any Apple product and never will.’

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed on Thursday it had uncovered an American espionage operation that compromised thousands of iPhones using spyware

The NSA declined to comment.

The FSB, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB, said that several thousand Apple devices had been infected, including those of domestic Russian users as well as foreign diplomats based in Russia and the former Soviet Union. 

The FSB said the American hackers had compromised diplomats from Israel, Syria, China and NATO members in the espionage campaign.

Israeli officials declined to comment. Chinese, Syrian and NATO representatives were not immediately available for comment.

Moscow-based cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab said dozens of its employees’ devices were compromised in the operation. 

‘The attack is carried out using an invisible iMessage with a malicious attachment, which, using a number of vulnerabilities in the iOS operating system, is executed on a device and installs spyware,’ the Kremlin-linked firm said in a blog post.

‘The deployment of the spyware is completely hidden and requires no action from the user.

‘The spyware then quietly transmits private information to remote servers: microphone recordings, photos from instant messengers, geolocation, and data about a number of other activities of the owner of the infected device.’

The FSB claimed the plot showed ‘close cooperation’ between Apple and the National Security Agency (NSA), the US agency responsible for cryptographic and communications intelligence and security 

Kaspersky CEO Eugene Kaspersky said on Twitter that dozens of his employees’ phones were compromised in the operation, which his company described as ‘an extremely complex, professionally targeted cyberattack’ that had targeted workers in ‘top and middle-management.’

Kaspersky researcher Igor Kuznetsov told Reuters that his company had independently discovered anomalous traffic on its corporate Wi-Fi network around the start of the year. 

He said Kaspersky did not circulate its findings to Russia’s Computer Emergency Response Team until earlier on Thursday.

He said he could not comment on Moscow’s allegation that Americans were responsible for the hacking or that thousands of others had been targeted.

‘It’s very hard to attribute anything to anyone,’ he said.

In a blog post, Kaspersky said the oldest traces of infection it discovered dated back to 2019. 

‘As of the time of writing in June 2023, the attack is ongoing,’ the company said. It added that while its staff was hit, ‘we are quite confident that Kaspersky was not the main target of this cyberattack.’

The United States is the world’s top cyber power in terms of intent and capability, according to Harvard University’s Belfer Center Cyber 2022 Power Index, followed by China, Russia, the United Kingdom and Australia.

Both the Kremlin and Russia’s foreign ministry pointed to the significance of the matter.

Apple firmly denied the allegation from the Kremlin (pictured is a view of the Senate Palace of the Kremlin from the Red Square in Moscow) saying: ‘We have never worked with any government to insert a backdoor into any Apple product and never will.’ 

‘The hidden data collection was carried out through software vulnerabilities in US-made mobile phones,’ Russia’s foreign ministry said in a statement.

‘The U.S. intelligence services have been using IT corporations for decades in order to collect large-scale data of Internet users without their knowledge,’ the ministry said.

Russian officials said the plot had been uncovered as part of a joint effort by FSB officers and those of the Federal Guards Service (FSO), a powerful agency that runs the Kremlin bodyguard and was also once the KGB’s Ninth Directorate.

Officials in Russia, which Western spies say has constructed a very sophisticated domestic surveillance structure, have long questioned the security of US technology.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said all officials in the presidential administration knew that gadgets such as iPhones were ‘absolutely transparent.’

Earlier this year, the Kremlin told officials involved in preparations for Russia’s 2024 presidential election to stop using Apple iPhones because of concerns that the devices are vulnerable to Western intelligence agencies, the Kommersant newspaper reported.

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