(San Francisco) Apple Corps has announced that it has fixed a computer bug that could exploit controversial Pegasus software from the Israeli company NSO to infect branded devices without even clicking the user link.
Citizen Lab researchers have identified the bug, which found that the Saudi activist’s iPhone was infected with Apple’s messaging system, iMessage.
According to this cybersecurity organization at the University of Toronto, Pegasus has been using this vulnerability “at least since February 2021”.
“This extortion, which we call extortion, targeted Apple’s image rendering library and worked against Apple’s iOS, MacOS and WatchOS devices,” he said.
“Apple is aware of a report that could have exploited this bug,” the tech giant said in an update note released Monday.
Citizen Lab was instrumental in uncovering the mass spy scandal through Pegasus in July.
In total, the case relates to a list of 50,000 telephone numbers in the world selected by NSO customers since 2016, according to the associations Amnesty and Forbidden Stories.
Ron Debert, director of the Citizen Lab, the American intelligence agency, joked in July that Pegasus would “buy its own NSA”.
Apple did not immediately respond to an AFP request.
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