Centre rubbishes Opposition's hacking claim, says compulsive critics want to distract Indian people

The Central government on Tuesday rebuffed Opposition leaders' claims that they received notifications on their Apple phones regarding a possible 'state-sponsored' hacking attack.

However, the government has claimed that it is very serious about the issue and that it has issued an ordered probe into the matter. "We are serious about these allegations and we want the complainants to go through the investigation," IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnav said at a briefing. He said that the complaints require deep technical understanding and certain agencies will be involved in the investigation.

Furthermore, Vaishnaw claimed that the Opposition leaders cannot digest India's progress under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and are indulging in compulsive critique. "There are many compulsive critics in our country. Their only job is to criticise the government," he said.


"From the mail sent by from Apple, it can be understood that they have no clear information, they have sent alerts on the basis of an estimate. This is vague. Apple has released a clarification that the allegations by compulsive critics are not true. Such advisories have been sent to people in 150 countries. The people who cannot see the growth of the country are doing destructive politics," Vaishnaw added.

Earlier in the day, prominent Opposition leaders part of the INDIA bloc took to social media claiming they got a message from Apple Inc saying their phones are likely being targeted by 'state-sponsored' attackers.

"Apple believes you are being targeted by state-sponsored attackers who are trying to remotely compromise the iPhone associated with your Apple ID. These attackers are likely targeting you individually because of who you are or what you do. If your device is compromised by a state-sponsored attacker, they may be able to remotely access your sensitive data, communications, or even the camera and microphone. While it's possible this is a false alarm, please take this warning seriously," it stated.

Shiv Sena (UBT) MP Priyanka Chaturvedi, Trinamool Congress' Mahua Moitra, Aam Aadmi Party's Raghav Chadha, Congress' Shashi Tharoor and his party's media and publicity department head Pawan Khera shared the message from Apple on X. CPI(M)general secretary Sitaram Yechury also received a similar message.

Responding to the opposition leaders, BJP's Amit Malviya said in a post on X, "Usual suspects raising a storm over ‘state sponsored' attack and pretending to be martyrs is all good… But this hullabaloo, in all probability, like in the past, will end up as damp squib!

Apple in its statement said that detecting these attacks relies on threat intelligence signals that are often imperfect and incomplete. It’s possible that some Apple threat notifications may be false alarms, or that some attacks are not detected, the company said