Apple responds to opposition leaders' concerns over state-sponsored attack warnings

• Apple issues a statement addressing the concerns raised by opposition leaders receiving warnings 
• The statement emphasizes the complexity of attributing such threats to specific attackers, highlighting the challenges posed by their sophistication and evolving tactics
• Apple acknowledges the potential for false alarms and undetected attacks underscoring the importance of keeping threat notification criteria confidential

Apple released a statement on Tuesday in response to concerns raised by at least seven opposition leaders who reported receiving emails from the tech company warning about possible 'state-sponsored' attackers attempting to remotely compromise their iPhones. The statement clarified Apple's position on these notifications, emphasizing the complexity of identifying and attributing state-sponsored threats.

According to the statement, “Apple does not attribute the threat notifications to any specific state-sponsored attacker. 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. We are unable to provide information about what causes us to issue threat notifications, as that may help state-sponsored attackers adapt their behaviour to evade detection in the future”, the Apple statement added.

Prominent opposition leaders, including Shashi Tharoor and Pawan Khera from the Congress party, Priyanka Chaturvedi of Shiv Sena, Mahua Moitra from Trinamool Congress, and Raghav Chadha of the Aam Aadmi Party, had reported receiving these warning emails from Apple.