Apple releases major update to stop spyware on iPhones

Apple issued new emergency updates last Monday to block a critical Pegasus spyware vulnerability that security researchers say is highly invasive without even selecting a link or entering a page.

The Tim Cook company and experts urged users of iPhone and other devices with the iOS system to install this patch urgently.

According to experts, this vulnerability has been exploited by Pegasus to spy on a Saudi activist. Researchers at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab said the software exploit has been in use since February and has been used to deploy spyware made by Israeli firm NSO Group. In addition, they reported that he was allegedly used to monitor journalists and human rights defenders in multiple countries, CNN reported.

Using a novel method and without the need to click, Pegasus could turn on a user’s camera and microphone, record their messages, text messages, emails, calls, even those sent through encrypted messages and telephone applications such as Signal, and send it back to NSO clients in Governments.

“This spyware can do everything an iPhone user can do on their device and more,” explained John-Scott Railton, Senior Researcher at Citizen Lab, who teamed up with Bill Marczak, also Senior Researcher at Citizen Lab, to describe the find.

Apple credited Citizen Lab researchers with discovering the vulnerability, but an Apple spokesperson declined to comment further.

In 2019, Facebook accused the NSO Group in a lawsuit of being an accessory to a hack of 1,400 mobile devices that used WhatsApp. However, the company denied the allegations at the time.