Apple summoned to soften impact of hack warnings

Apple’s warnings in October to Indian opposition politicians that government hackers may have hacked their phones prompted Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration to quickly demand the U.S. firm soften its message.

Apple’s India representatives were called by administration officials who demanded that company help weaken the political impact of the warnings, the newspaper said citing three unidentified sources.

An Apple security expert was also summoned from outside the country to a meeting in New Delhi and the expert was pressed to come up with alternative explanations for the warnings, it said.

Apple and India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Indian opposition has accused Modi’s government of trying to hack the phones of senior opposition politicians who said they had received warning messages from Apple.

At the time, some of the lawmakers shared screenshots on social media of a notification quoting the iPhone manufacturer as saying: “Apple believes you are being targeted by state-sponsored attackers who are trying to remotely compromise the iPhone associated with your Apple ID”.

Apple has previously said it did not attribute the threat notifications to “any specific state-sponsored attacker”. Reuters