Apple denies knowledge of NSA’s iPhone program

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Yesterday, a trove of secret documents was released regarding the NSA and its ongoing spying on citizens both abroad and here in the US. One of the programs mentioned, called DROPOUTJEEP, is particularly scary as it can give the Agency complete control of any iPhone.

These are some pretty serious allegations made against the NSA and maybe more-so Apple, who either has several unknown security holes in its mobile OS or is consciously giving the NSA access. Well the company just responded to these claims, and it appears to be the former…

AllThingsD has Apple’s full statement:

“Apple has never worked with the NSA to create a backdoor in any of our products, including iPhone. Additionally, we have been unaware of this alleged NSA program targeting our products. We care deeply about our customers’ privacy and security. Our team is continuously working to make our products even more secure, and we make it easy for customers to keep their software up to date with the latest advancements. Whenever we hear about attempts to undermine Apple’s industry-leading security, we thoroughly investigate and take appropriate steps to protect our customers. We will continue to use our resources to stay ahead of malicious hackers and defend our customers from security attacks, regardless of who’s behind them.”

For those that missed it, Apple is responding to claims that it might be leaving exploits in iOS for the NSA to install backdoors into its iPhones. The Agency has apparently been rerouting shipments of online orders for the handset, installing spyware, and shipping them off to users.

This is the second time Apple has publicly responded to allegations that it is involved in some type of spying program with the National Security Agency. Back in June, the company was mentioned along with 8 other tech giants as members of the PRSIM program, which it also denied.

While the consensus seems to be that ‘this shouldn’t matter if you’re not doing anything illegal,’ there are a lot of users who feel this is a violation of their privacy and even against the law. Apple, for its part, has been pushing for more transparency on court-ordered user info requests.