Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

support.apple.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 166 posts

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#21

Post by RL_Quine »

suprfsat wrote: post #10
thih9 wrote: post #7

I'm surprised to see protection against state sponsored attacks implemented by a company as big as Apple. Is any other 'mainstream' company offering a similar feature? Warrant canary [0] comes to mind, but that is usually a message to all users, as opposed to notifying an individual user. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warrant_canary

Gmail does it https://blog.google/threat-analysis-group/updates-about-gove...

Yeah, I loved having my work gmail account peppered with a giant red banner warmomg "THIS ACCOUNT IS THE TARGET OF STATE SPONSORED HACKERS". That was fun. We didn't really know how to respond or attempt to mitigate such a warning so, left it ignored.

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#22

Post by imarid »

I know of one case of a Polish prosecutor who does not obey (do not want to bend the law) Zbigniew Ziobro, who is both the minister of justice and the prosecutor general. She received a notification from Apple just today.

Source: https://mobile.twitter.com/e_wrzosek/status/1463551631648251...

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#23

Post by varjag »

BluSyn wrote: post #15

I see a lot of pessimism in the comments. But I think this is a great step in the right direction. Other companies should take note. More of this, please!

Google does this for some time at least.

I received an imminent advanced security threat notification back in January 2019. Urging me to get one of those 2fa dongles (which I did). And just as well, because the next month my account was locked due to an attempted unathorized access.

(whoever works on this at Google, thank you)

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#26

Post by jsnell »

BluSyn wrote: post #15

I see a lot of pessimism in the comments. But I think this is a great step in the right direction. Other companies should take note. More of this, please!

Apple is like the last company in that space to do this. Google has had these warnings since 2012. Facebook, Microsoft and Twitter since 2015.

(I agree that it's great that Apple is finally doing this. But it seems entirely par for the course for them to be a decade late and still get the credit.)

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#27

Post by kube-system »

bsd44 wrote: post #14

"If Apple discovers activity consistent with a state-sponsored attack" I am really interested in understanding more about a "state-sponsored attack" as someone who works in Ops and has experience in CyberSec. All these years working in the industry and I had no idea you could identify an "attack" that easily.

It’s not easy.

> Unlike traditional cybercriminals, state-sponsored attackers apply exceptional resources to target a very small number of specific individuals and their devices, which makes these attacks much harder to detect and prevent.

> State-sponsored attackers are very well-funded and sophisticated, and their attacks evolve over time. Detecting such attacks relies on threat intelligence signals that are often imperfect and incomplete. It’s possible that some Apple threat notifications may be false alarms, or that some attacks are not detected.

Identifying the source of these attacks is often done by analyzing the tools and techniques, in comparison to other known tools and methods, and/or by information gathered in meat space.

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#28

Post by questiondev »

except in china, i pray that the people of the free world unite from within all countries and say enough is enough to their oppressors. it is wild to think that we still have ill actors in high ranks that are from bloodlines upon bloodlines of “ownership” of nations. there really still is a ruling class that has existed forever, sounds like a conspiracy until you look at who is buddies with who

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#29

Post by zepto »

grlass wrote: post #19
zepto wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/us.html Contains the canary: “To date, Apple has not received any orders for bulk data.”

that appears to only be connected to requests under those specific acts. Otherwise, given their involvement in the PRISM program [1] I don't see how we can take that canary seriously. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)

The specific acts include FISA requests.

Re: Apple will notify users about state-sponsored cybersecurity threats

#30

Post by smoldesu »

BluSyn wrote: post #15

I see a lot of pessimism in the comments. But I think this is a great step in the right direction. Other companies should take note. More of this, please!

I might care if Apple had a history of protecting US citizens from their own government, or shielding Chinese users from their own tyrannical surveillance systems.
Post reply on HN