Pegasus Spyware threat to the iPhone

IPhone spyware made by the billion-dollar surveillance company NSO has exposed major problems in Apple’s iMessage security by a spyware called Pegasus Spyware, according to a security expert who has spent years investigating Israeli commercial hacks. Reports from Amnesty International and Citizen Lab, following an alleged data breach on 50,000 potential targets of NSO’s Pegasus spyware, claimed that they had both seen a “zero click” attack exploiting numerous vulnerabilities on an iPhone 12 Pro Max running iOS 14.6 in July 2021. That included iMessage hacks.

Right now, Marczak adds, this is not a problem for the average iPhone user, as the target list acquired by the nonprofit Forbidden Stories primarily focused on people at high risk of government surveillance, from journalists like the editor of the Financial Times, Roula Khalaf, to close people. the murdered journalist Jamal Khashogghi.

Heads of state were also reportedly on the list of potential targets. NSO has been repeatedly denounced in the past five years after its tools were seen to target Mexican lawyers, Saudi activists and journalists around the world, although it claims its software is used to help governments catch the most criminals. But if Apple doesn’t nip this in the bud, these kinds of no-click iMessage attacks will inevitably proliferate to less sophisticated hackers like cybercriminals.

Apple, however, believes that its technology is doing a good job protecting users from text-based attacks. For example, the tech giant said that if a website link is sent to a user via iMessage, they will not land on a web page to preview the site and only accept a static preview image from the site. Sender so in theory we can be calm but… Do not forget that it is best to take one or another security measure since you can never be completely sure as we well know.

See also:
XcodeSpy new malicious project against MacOS
xHelper Trojan that hits Android real hard

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