Is this spyware possible due to engineering flaws in Apple products?
Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
51–60 of 301 posts
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure this is true > There are many more nations than there are countries, especially within the US. Each US state has "a political boundary, a flag and an anthem". So that's 50 of them. How many nations are there in the US?
It’s “true” if you, as the GP seems to intend to, define “country” to be “state that is sovereign in the sense of a principal subject of international law”. This is, to say the least, not the only definition of a “country” (and is also among the definitions of “nation”.)
"Country" definitely does not mean "sovereign states" in English.
And I do mean "English" because in the UK, England, Scotland and Wales are officially considered "countries" by the UK government...
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#53Note that "mercenary spyware" is the politically correct term Apple chose for "state-sponsored attacker" because Modi complained that Apple was exposing them for using illegal NSO Group spyware.
The power of language, where "state-sponsored" too accurately directs the population's attention to their government but where mercenary is vague and non-aiming - where a simple change in language is enough to quell that ire and attention of authoritarians; or should I say authoritarian behaviour to not out them directly as authoritarians?
Best to refer to them as the “Ministry of Truth”. We’ve always been at war with Eurasia.
I wonder if someone has made a “De-bullshitify English” Chrome add on to replace phrases like “mercenary hacker” and “officer-involved shooting” with more semantically correct phrases.
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Apple needs to work with authoritarian governments, or nobody is going to build our iPhones. Not only is this objectively true, I also have an iPhone. It's not news to me but it still makes me do a double take every time. Maybe I should try oscillating to Linux and FairPhone again...
I think as of right now, it's nearly impossible to buy a guilt-free computer of any kind. It's a spectrum, obviously, but I think if you were to audit every component of any computer you buy from basically any company, you'd eventually get something kind of depressing. A relative of mine in the defense industry has told me that, generally speaking, the DoD requires that none of the components in missiles have parts m…
When I have to point to something when I say I doubt manufacturing will ever come back to the west, I point to the fact we can't manufacture the simplest of things ourselves anymore.
Thanks Delta Airlines, whose metal nametags are literally just cut sheets of aluminum with some paint on them and are still Made in China. Someone seriously wants to tell me we can manufacture bleeding edge tech when we can't even cut and paint our own fucking sheet metal?
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#55Note that "mercenary spyware" is the politically correct term Apple chose for "state-sponsored attacker" because Modi complained that Apple was exposing them for using illegal NSO Group spyware.
Interesting. By reading that term, I thought the exact opposite. Mercenary sounds decidedly like a non-state actor.
Why? Mercenaries are most often hired by state actors.
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#56Pet peeve: This story alternates between "nations" and "countries" as if they were synonyms. A nation is a group of people sharing cultural, ethnic, and historical ties. There are many more nations than there are countries, especially within the US. A country has a political boundary, a flag and an anthem. It's one thing to use a word in the wrong way, because maybe you don't know the other word exists, and that's ok…
It's TechCrunch, pretty much the bottom of the barrel.
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#57Note that "mercenary spyware" is the politically correct term Apple chose for "state-sponsored attacker" because Modi complained that Apple was exposing them for using illegal NSO Group spyware.
Technically speaking, Apple placing iCloud services for users in China on CCP-controlled hardware (as required for their continued operation in China) is also a “state-sponsored attack”.
Not that they have a choice, given that their most profitable product lines are all basically 95%+ manufactured in China by Chinese nationals working for Chinese companies.
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
On the Apple Support page here: https://support.apple.com/en-in/102174 In the screenshot it says the threat notification was sent "via email and iMessage", so it would not be displayed in any different way on your phone, which I also find surprising. I definitely wouldn't expect to receive something like this as an Email, and I have turned off iMessage.
Just out of curiosity why would you have imessage turned off?
iMessage histories are backed up in the nightly automatic non-e2ee iCloud Backup, effectively backdooring iMessage’s “end to end encryption” by escrowing the plaintext to a not-endpoint.
Apple can read approximately everyone’s iMessages out of their backups. It’s not private or secure, and claiming it is end to end encrypted is misleading almost to the point of being actually false.
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#59Note that "mercenary spyware" is the politically correct term Apple chose for "state-sponsored attacker" because Modi complained that Apple was exposing them for using illegal NSO Group spyware.
Technically speaking, Apple placing iCloud services for users in China on CCP-controlled hardware (as required for their continued operation in China) is also a “state-sponsored attack”. Not that they have a choice, given that their most profitable product lines are all basically 95%+ manufactured in China by Chinese nationals working for Chinese companies.
So apple/companies complying to US/EU laws is state-sponored attacks and not following local law?
Re: Apple alerts users in 92 nations to mercenary spyware attacks
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Technically speaking, Apple placing iCloud services for users in China on CCP-controlled hardware (as required for their continued operation in China) is also a “state-sponsored attack”. Not that they have a choice, given that their most profitable product lines are all basically 95%+ manufactured in China by Chinese nationals working for Chinese companies.
So apple/companies complying to US/EU laws is state-sponored attacks and not following local law?
https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN1ZK1CO/
Yes. We’re well past “following local law” and into “active cooperation” territory. Apple by nature can’t have adversarial relationships with the US or Chinese governments or they’d get squashed like a bug.
One might even argue they have a fiduciary duty to not pick fights with city hall.