MOSCOW Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) announced on Thursday June 1 that it has identified a US National Security Agency (NSA) attempt to exploit previously unknown backdoor vulnerabilities in Apple phones.
The FSB, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB, stated that several thousand Apple phones, including those of domestic Russian subscribers, had been infected.
The Russian espionage service also stated that it targeted telephones belonging to NATO states, Israel, Syria, and China, as well as foreign diplomats living in Russia and the former Soviet Union.
Neither Apple nor the NSA immediately responded to emailed requests for comment outside usual U.S. business hours and the plot has shown the close relationship between Apple and the National Security Agency, the US responsible for Us cryptographic and communication intelligence and security said the FSB
The FSB stated that “the company offers American intelligence agencies a broad range of opportunities to monitor any persons of interest to the White House and their partners in anti-Russian activities, as well as their own citizens.”
Remarkably, the Federal Guard Service, the Agency which protects Russia’s leaders was credited with helping in discovering the plot the FSB mentioned.
Writing Juliet Onwurah; Editing by Julian Osamoto