Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi sparked a scandal and raised worries about security and privacy when he claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's administration was trying to hack the iPhones of prominent opposition leaders.
The charges follow Apple sending warning letters to a number of politicians, warning that state-sponsored attackers may be targeting them.
A number of opposition MPs posted screenshots of their Apple notifications on social media. The messages said: "Apple believes you are being targeted by state-sponsored attackers who are trying to remotely compromise the iPhone associated with your Apple ID."
There were concerns about a possible cybersecurity and privacy compromise after receiving this message.
Rahul Gandhi, addressing Prime Minister Modi and his government, said, "Hack us all you want, but we (the opposition) will not stop questioning you," in a defiant response to the purported hacking efforts during a news conference in New Delhi.
The claim exacerbates the already volatile political environment in India, where opposition parties have continuously criticized the policies and behavior of the ruling party.
India's Minister of Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw, revealed that Apple has been invited to participate in the government's inquiry into the MPs' remarks, expressing worry about them.
The government has not said whether it was involved in the reported hacking attempts or not.
Apple made it clear in its reaction to the incident that it did not link any particular state-sponsored attacker to the threat warnings. The company admitted that threat intelligence signals were not always reliable in identifying state-sponsored assaults and that these attacks were constantly changing.
This calls into question the veracity of these alerts and the potential for false alarms.
The Congress party spokesperson for Rahul Gandhi, Jairam Ramesh, rejected Apple's explanation, calling it a "long-winded non-denial" of a security failure. The gravity of the problem and the requirement for a comprehensive inquiry are highlighted by this critique.
This latest controversy brings to mind the Pegasus spyware incident of 2021, in which the Indian government was charged with spying on journalists, activists, and politicians, including Rahul Gandhi, using Israeli-made malware. Inquiries about the government's role in the acquisition of Pegasus spyware for monitoring purposes have not received an official response.