Apple & Meta Gave Sensitive User Data To Hackers Posing As Officials, Report Says
Under normal circumstances, such requests require a search warrant or subpoena signed by a judge. But emergency demands don't require a court order
Tech biggies Apple and Meta (Facebook's parent company) reportedly provided data to hackers who had used forged documents to gain access to information.
According to people with knowledge of the matter who told Bloomberg, Apple and Meta essentially provided subscriber details like a customer's address, phone number, and IP address sometime in the middle of 2021 in response to the forged "emergency data requests."
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Duping the world's largest tech companies
Under normal circumstances, such requests require a search warrant or subpoena signed by a judge. But emergency demands don't require a court order.
It also appears that Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, received requests from the same hackers but it's unclear whether the company provided them with user information. In addition, we do not know for sure how many times Apple and Meta were fooled by hackers masquerading as law enforcement officers.
Reuters
Also read: Anonymous Hackers Unleash Cyber War On Russia, Pull Down Govt Websites
Cybersecurity experts think that some of these hackers are minors from the UK and the US. In fact, one of them is suspected to be the orchestrator behind the cybercrime group Lapsus$ that hacked Microsoft and Samsung.
Apple told Bloomberg that law enforcement agents seeking information "may be contacted and asked to confirm to Apple that the emergency request was legitimate."
Reuters
Meta's spokesperson Andy Stone, in a statement, said that they "review every data request for legal sufficiency and use advanced systems and processes to validate law enforcement requests and detect abuse."
Also read: Hackers Tricked 300,000 Android Users To Steal Passwords: Here's How
What do you think - did Apple and Meta really overlook security measures this time around? Let us know what you think in the comments below. For more in the world of technology and science, keep reading Indiatimes.com.
References
Al Jazeera. (2022, March 30). Apple, Meta gave user data to hackers who used forged requests. Technology News | Al Jazeera.
Bloomberg (2022, March 30). Apple, Meta gave user data to hackers who forged legal requests.
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