He invited Apple to “join the investigation with real, accurate information on the alleged state sponsored attacks”. Read more at straitstimes.com.
Apple on Tuesday warned at least 20 of India’s prominent opposition leaders and journalists that their iPhones might be targets of state-sponsored hacking attempts.
So far, a dozen opposition politicians have confirmed they received the message from Apple, and many posted screenshots of it on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter. They include parliamentarians from opposition parties such as Mr Shashi Tharoor from Congress, Ms Mahua Moitra from Trinamool Congress, Mr Raghav Chadha from the Aam Aadmi Party, and Mr Asaduddin Owaisi from the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen party.
Others who confirmed they had received such alerts were Congress spokespersons Pawan Khera and Supriya Shrinate, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, Communist Party of India general secretary Sitaram Yechury, and Telangana state minister K.T. Rama Rao from the Bharat Rashtra Samithi party. She said vocal opposition leaders like her were living in “a complete Orwellian reality”, referring to being constantly watched, and having their privacy and security violated by electronic surveillance.
Mr Gandhi said several people who work in his office had also received the alert. “Snooping of opposition leaders... is clearly a sign of panic,” he said at a press conference in New Delhi on Tuesday. While Apple’s alerts did not specify which government sponsored the attacks, Mr Varadarajan from The Wire, which was also involved in the 2021 Pegasus investigations, said that “based on the list of targets – top-drawer opposition leaders, journalists, and the interest in Telangana state that is going to the polls – it is hard to imagine which other state would have an interest in spending millions of dollars to compromise these phones”.