Israeli spyware maker NSO Group deployed at least three new "zero-click" hacks against iPhones last year, finding ways to penetrate some of Apple's latest software, researchers at Citizen Lab have discovered. From a report: The attacks struck phones with iOS 15 and early versions of iOS 16 operating software, Citizen Lab said in a report Tuesday. The lab, based at the University of Toronto, shared its results with Apple, which has now fixed the flaws that NSO had been exploiting. It's the latest sign of NSO's ongoing efforts to create spyware that penetrates iPhones without users taking any actions that allow it in. Citizen Lab has detected multiple NSO hacking methods in past years while examining the phones of likely targets, including human rights workers and journalists.

While it is unsettling to civil rights groups that NSO was able to come up with multiple new means of attack, it did not surprise them. "It is their core business," said Bill Marczak, a senior researcher at Citizen Lab. "Despite Apple notifying targets, and the Commerce Department putting NSO on a blacklist, and the Israeli ministry cracking down on export licenses -- which are all good steps and raising costs -- NSO for the moment is absorbing those costs," Marczak said. Given the financial and legal fights NSO is involved in, Marczak said it was an open question how long NSO could keep finding or buying new exploits that are effective.

In addition to the company's long-rumored mixed reality headset, Apple is expected to launch new MacBooks, as well as a "major" update to the Apple Watch's watchOS software at its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in June. All told, WWDC 2023 could end up being one of Apple's "biggest product launch events ever," according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. The Verge reports: Let's start with the Macs. Gurman doesn't explicitly say which macOS-powered computers Apple could announce in June, but lists around half a dozen devices it currently plans to release this year or early 2024. There's an all new 15-inch MacBook Air, an updated 13-inch MacBook Air, and new 13-inch and "high-end" MacBook Pros. Meanwhile on the Mac side Apple still needs to replace its last Intel-powered device, the Mac Pro, with an Apple Silicon model, and it also reportedly has plans to refresh its all-in-one 24-inch iMac.

Bloomberg's report notes that "at least some of the new laptops" will make an appearance. The bad news is that none are likely to run Apple's next-generation M3 chips, and will instead ship with M2-era processors. Apple apparently also has a couple of new Mac Studio computers in development, but Bloomberg is less clear on when they could launch.

Over on the software side, which is WWDC's traditional focus, watchOS will reportedly receive a "major" update that includes a revamped interface. Otherwise, we could be in for a relatively quiet show on the operating system front as iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and tvOS are not expected to receive major updates this year. Gurman does say that work to allow sideloading on iOS to comply with upcoming EU legislation is ongoing.

An anonymous reader writes: Security researchers are examining newly discovered Mac ransomware samples from the notorious gang LockBit, marking the first known example of a prominent ransomware group toying with macOS versions of its malware. Spotted by MalwareHunterTeam, the samples of ransomware encryptors seem to have first cropped up in the malware analysis repository VirusTotal in November and December 2022, but went unnoticed until yesterday. LockBit seems to have created both a version of the encryptor targeting newer Macs running Apple processors and older Macs that ran on Apple's PowerPC chips.

Researchers say the LockBit Mac ransomware appears to be more of a first foray than anything that's fully functional and ready to be used. But the tinkering could indicate future plans, especially given that more businesses and institutions have been incorporating Macs, which could make it more appealing for ransomware attackers to invest time and resources so they can target Apple computers. "It's unsurprising but concerning that a large and successful ransomware group has now set their sights on macOS," says longtime Mac security researcher and Objective-See Foundation founder Patrick Wardle. "It would be naive to assume that LockBit won't improve and iterate on this ransomware, potentially creating a more effective and destructive version."

For now, Wardle notes that LockBit's macOS encryptors seem to be in a very early phase and still have fundamental development issues like crashing on launch. And to create truly effective attack tools, LockBit will need to figure out how to circumvent macOS protections, including validity checks that Apple has added in recent years for running new software on Macs. "In some sense, Apple is ahead of the threat, as recent versions of macOS ship with a myriad of built-in security mechanisms aimed to directly thwart, or at least reduce the impact of, ransomware attacks," Wardle says. "However, well-funded ransomware groups will continue to evolve their malicious creations."

Apple in iOS 17 will for the first time allow iPhone users to download apps hosted outside of its official App Store, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. From a report: Otherwise known as sideloading, the change would allow customers to download apps without needing to use the App Store, which would mean developers wouldn't need to pay Apple's 15 to 30 percent fees. The European Union's Digital Markets Act (DMA), which went into effect on November 1, 2022, requires "gatekeeper" companies to open up their services and platforms to other companies and developers. The DMA will have a big impact on Apple's platforms, and it could result in Apple making major changes to the App Store, Messages, FaceTime, Siri, and more. Apple is planning to implement sideloading support to comply with the new European regulations by next year, according to Gurman.

Apple Card customers in the U.S. can open a savings account and earn interests starting today. When the company originally announced the new financial product back in October, Apple said that it couldn't share what interest rate would be paid out on these accounts because rates are fluctuating so much these days. From a report: As of today, Apple is going to offer an APY of 4.15%. It looks like a competitive offering when you look at data from Bankrate -- you can currently find savings accounts that offer an APY of 3.5% to 4.75%. The company isn't making any promise when it comes to future interest rates. It could go up and down at any time. Apple has partnered with Goldman Sachs once again for the banking feature. Savings accounts are technically managed by Goldman Sachs, which means that balances are covered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). This high-yield savings account has been created specifically for Apple Card customers. When customers pay with their Apple Card, they get cash back on all purchases. By default, all purchases grant you 1% in cash rewards and 2% for all purchases made using Apple Pay. Purchases with select merchants unlock 3% in rewards.

Steve Jobs Archive: The official ebook edition of Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words is free to read on Apple Books and from participating libraries through our partners at Libby. You can also download the book to view it on any compatible e-reader: our EPUB file works on almost all tablets, smartphones, desktop computers, and digital reading devices. From a speech in 2007: There's lots of ways to be, as a person. And some people express their deep appreciation in different ways. But one of the ways that I believe people express their appreciation to the rest of humanity is to make something wonderful and put it out there.

And you never meet the people. You never shake their hands. You never hear their story or tell yours. But somehow, in the act of making something with a great deal of care and love, something's transmitted there. And it's a way of expressing to the rest of our species our deep appreciation. So we need to be true to who we are and remember what's really important to us."

Apple said it will invest up to an additional $200 million in its Restore Fund, which was created in 2021 to remove carbon from the atmosphere. Reuters reports: The additional investment is expected to help the fund start new projects and carry forward its previously stated goal to remove about 1 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year, the company said. Apple is making efforts to become carbon neutral through its entire supply chain and the life cycle of every product by 2030.

The fund, launched with Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N) and nonprofit Conservation International, has invested in forest properties in Brazil and Paraguay in the last two years. The expanded fund will be managed by Climate Asset Management, a joint venture of HSBC Asset Management and Pollination, Apple added.

The French Competition Authority is likely to move forward soon with an antitrust investigation into Apple over complaints tied to 2021 changes to its app tracking policies, Axios reported, citing sources. From the report: A formal investigation would mark the first major government move taken globally against Apple related to privacy rule changes that upended the digital advertising world. French regulators are favoring issuing a formal "Statement of Objections" to parties involved in the matter in coming weeks, sources told Axios.

That step would signal to groups that issued initial complaints about Apple's actions and Apple that the authority found evidence of illegal anticompetitive behavior in its initial review of the complaints it received. The 2020 complaint argues that Apple's app tracking changes did not adequately adhere to European Union privacy rules and that Apple failed to hold itself to the same ad targeting standards that it forced on its competitors because it targeted iOS users with ads from app tracking data. The complaint was filed jointly by four French advertising trade groups -- IAB France, Mobile Marketing Association (MMA), SRI and UDECAM.

After a nice spike during the first two years of the pandemic, global PC shipments continued to drop for a fourth consecutive quarter. Analyst firm IDC's latest figure has Q1 down 29% from the same time last year. Canalys paints an even more troubling picture for the industry, with a full 33% drop. From a report: A disappointing 2022 holiday set the stage for the beginning of the year, as vendor inventory has continued to pile up -- a trend that is expected to carry at least into Q3. The plunge has been so consistent that last quarter's figures dipped below those of Q1 2019, putting worldwide shipments below their pre-pandemic level.

[...] The culprits? For starters, a lot of people purchased news systems in 2020 and 2021 as their work settings adapted to a global pandemic. Laptops tend to have a life span of around three to five years. Desktops are even longer, at three to eight. People are likely to be content with their systems for a few years at least. As vendors go, both IDC and Canalys have Apple suffering the largest drop at 40.5 and 45.5%, respectively. That's a staggering figure, likely owing -- at least in part â" to the company coming back down to earth, as the M1 chip managed to buck larger category trends in 2021/2022. That chip marked Apple's biggest PC computing update since the company shifted to Intel decades prior. In spite of what ad copy might suggest, you don't get a generational shift every year.

An anonymous reader shares a report from the New York Post: A supposed glitch in the popular "Find My iPhone" app has been directing random strangers to the home of an unsuspecting Texas dad at all hours of the day, falsely accusing him of stealing their electronic devices.

[Software engineer] Scott Schuster told the local news station KTRK that he's been visited by close to a dozen irate people over the past few years, telling him that their missing phone had last pinged at his address. "[I] had to wake up and go answer the door and explain to them that I didn't have their device, and people don't tend to believe you," the dad of two told the outlet.
The Texas resident tells KTRK that his biggest concern was "someone coming to the house potentially with a weapon."

And the same station reports that local sheriff Eric Fagan "said he was so shocked and concerned that he informed his patrol units and dispatchers, just in case anyone called about the address." "Apple needs to do more about this," Fagan said. "Please come out and check on this. This is your expertise. Mine is criminal and keeping our public safe here in Fort Bend County." Fagan added that Apple doing nothing puts a family's safety in jeopardy. "I would ask them to come out and see what they can do. It should be taken seriously. You are putting innocent lives at risk," he said....

There have been other high-profile device pinging errors elsewhere in the country, with at least one that brought armored vehicles to a neighborhood. In 2021, body camera footage captured a Denver police SWAT team raiding the home of a 77-year-old woman in Colorado over a false ping on the app. Denver officers believed she had stolen guns connected to a car theft after tracking a stolen iPhone to her address using the Find My app. That woman later sued the lead detective.

ABC13 has tried contacting the software giant since Tuesday. Someone called back, so we know they are aware of the incident. Still, no one has said if they are going to fix the issue, or at the very least, look into the matter.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from MacRumors: An Apple Store at the Alderwood Mall was burgled last weekend, with thieves infiltrating the location through a nearby coffee shop. According to Seattle's King 5 News, thieves broke into Seattle Coffee Gear, went into the bathroom, and cut a hole in the wall to get to the Apple Store backroom. The burglars were able to bypass the Apple Store's security system by using the adjacent coffee shop, stealing a total of 436 iPhones that were worth around $500,000.

According to Seattle Coffee Gear manager Eric Marks, the coffee shop is not noticeably adjacent to the Apple Store because of the way that the store is laid out. "I would have never suspected we were adjacent to the Apple Store, how it wraps around I mean," Marks told King 5 News. "So, someone really had to think it out and have access to the mall layout." Police were able to obtain surveillance footage of the theft, but as it is part of an active investigation, it has not yet been released. Nothing was stolen from the coffee shop, but it will cost $1,500 to replace locks and repair the bathroom wall.

Apple has been teasing plans for an India retail store since 2016. Seven years later, it's finally here. Quartz reports: The company finally released a picture of the barricade of its first ever Indian retail store in Mumbai, the country's financial hub, on Apr. 5. The store will be located in Jio World Drive -- the mall owned by India's richest man Mukesh Ambani -- in the upscale commercial hub called Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC). So far, Apple has only sold goods and offered services in India via authorized third-party retailers, or through online portals such as Amazon, Flipkart, and Paytm Mall.

Apple has chosen a prime location for its first retail outlet in India. Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC), which is morphing into the city's main business district, houses offices for multinational companies and banks. BKC recently made headlines for hosting what is being touted as India's answer to the Met Gala: the opening of the multi-disciplinary Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Arts Centre (NMACC). The launch of the first-of-its-kind cultural arts space was flanked by both Bollywood and Hollywood celebrities -- from Shahrukh Khan to Zendaya. "Hello Mumbai," says Apple on their website. "We are getting ready to welcome you aboard our first store in India. And raring to see where your creativity takes you at Apple BKC."

The Apple Mumbai store promises to offer one-on-one support with a Specialist, expert service and support at the Genius Bar, and product exchanges for credit towards a future purchase.

Apple's slowing growth and cash-rich balance sheet are again fueling speculation that the world's most valuable company should make a big acquisition. From a report: Entertainment giant Disney recently joined a long list of potential acquisition targets that over the years has grown to include Netflix, Tesla, Peloton and Sonos. They all have one thing in common: Anyone betting that Apple would buy them has so far been sorely disappointed. "You're probably missing the value of the business if you think the key catalyst for investment is a major acquisition," said Kevin Walkush, portfolio manager at Jensen Investment Management. "It's a low-probability bet." Apple is famous for eschewing splashy acquisitions in contrast with peers like Microsoft and Amazon, which have continued to make deals despite increasing scrutiny by regulators. Instead, Apple favors buying small startups to augment its home-grown pushes into new markets even if those efforts take many years to bear fruit.

Further adding to the excitement of the upcoming Linux 6.4 merge window is the mainline kernel seeing the Device Tree (DT) additions for Apple's current M2 devices including the MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and Mac Mini systems. From a report: The upstream kernel still has more work to go around the M1/M2 support compared to the downstream state with Asahi Linux, but at least now with this DT support will provide some basic level of upstream kernel support for the Apple M2. Asahi Linux lead developer Hector Martin today sent in the Apple SoC DT updates targeting the Linux 6.4 cycle for queuing into the SoC tree ahead of the merge window opening around the end of the month. The main addition with this pull request is adding the Apple M2 Device Tree series.

In every copy of macOS that has shipped since 2018, Apple has included the original Bitcoin whitepaper by Satoshi Nakamoto, and no-one seems to know why. From a report: The baffling discovery (or rediscovery - see below) was recently made by developer and waxy.org writer Andy Baio, who stumbled upon the PDF document while trying to fix a problem with his printer. Anyone with a Mac running macOS Mojave or later can see the PDF for themselves by typing the following command into Terminal:

open /System/Library/Image\ Capture/Devices/VirtualScanner.app/Contents/Resources/simpledoc.pdf

If you're running macOS 10.14 or later, the 184 KB Bitcoin PDF should immediately open in Preview. The document can also be located via Finder: Navigate to Macintosh HD -> System -> Library -> Image Capture -> Devices, then open the Contents -> Resources folder. The whitepaper titled "simpledoc.pdf" should be in there.

Apple said that some users are experiencing disruptions of its weather app on Tuesday, citing a data provider issue. From a report: The Cupertino, California-based company said on its website that issues for the app were reported at 11 p.m. New York time Monday and continued Tuesday. Apple said that precipitation forecasts for the next hour may be unavailable in Alaska "due to a data provider outage," but disruptions appear to be across various cities. All other services, such as the App Store, Apple TV and FaceTime, appear to be available and working without issue.

Apple will expand ProMotion to the standard iPhone models in two years, according to Ross Young, CEO of Display Supply Chain Consultants. ProMotion was first introduced on the iPhone 13 Pro models in 2021 and remains exclusive to Pro models for now. MacRumors reports: In a tweet today, Young provided a roadmap outlining various display-related technologies coming to future iPhones. Notably, the roadmap indicates that low-power LTPO display technology will be expanded to the standard iPhones in 2025, which Young said will enable ProMotion on these devices, allowing the display to ramp up to a 120Hz refresh rate for smoother scrolling and video content when necessary.

ProMotion would also allow the display to ramp down to a more power-efficient refresh rate. iPhone 13 Pro models can ramp down to 10Hz, while iPhone 14 Pro models can go as low as 1Hz, allowing for an always-on display that can show the Lock Screen's clock, widgets, notifications, and wallpaper even when the device is locked. All in all, the roadmap suggests that the so-called "iPhone 17" and "iPhone 17 Plus" will feature ProMotion, and likely an always-on display too. Young also claimed the "iPhone 17 Pro" will be the first iPhone to feature under-panel Face ID technology.

Tim Cook's vision for AR and VR hasn't changed. "For almost a decade, Apple's CEO has been banging the drum that AR is more important than VR and that AR is fundamentally about bringing people together," reports The Verge. "And he's still at it." From the report: "If you think about the technology itself with augmented reality, just to take one side of the AR/VR piece, the idea that you could overlay the physical world with things from the digital world could greatly enhance people's communication, people's connection," Cook told GQ's Zach Baron in a long and very interesting profile just published by the magazine. Cook told Baron that he's interested in collaboration; he said something about measuring glass walls; he said his thinking on glasses-as-gadget has changed over the years.

None of this is a product announcement, of course, only the latest in a long string of hints about what Apple sees in this space. Cook's been on this particular line since at least 2016, when he said on Good Morning America that AR "gives the capability for both of us to sit and be very present, talking to each other, but also have other things -- visually -- for both of us to see." [...] At various times over the years, Cook has said AR is a powerful technology for education, that he thinks it'll be as common as "eating three meals a day," and that he thinks AR is as big an idea as the smartphone. But he keeps coming back to the idea that AR should be meant to bring people together in the real world, not keep them apart or transport them to another universe entirely.

Cook also offered what sounds like an explanation for why the headset, which has been heavily rumored over the last couple of years, has taken so long to come out. "I'm not interested in putting together pieces of somebody else's stuff," he told GQ. "Because we want to control the primary technology. Because we know that's how you innovate." Maybe the most revealing thing in the story is the way Cook explains Apple -- or at least explains the way he hopes you'll see Apple. He talks frequently about Apple's environmental commitments, its loud fight against "the data-industrial complex," and the way Apple is trying to help people have better relationships with technology. (Conveniently ignoring that Apple is perhaps more responsible for our phone addictions than any other company, of course.) "Because my philosophy is, if you're looking at the phone more than you're looking in somebody's eyes, you're doing the wrong thing." Apple plans to unveil a mixed-reality headset on June 5th at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC).

An anonymous reader shares this report from the Washington Post: Steve Jobs never lived to be an old wise man.

But running Apple and Pixar, tumbling and thriving, earned him a lot of wisdom in his 56 years. Now, a small group of his family, friends and former colleagues have collected it into "Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words," available free to the public online starting on April 11. Somewhere between a posthumous memoir and a scrapbook album, it is told through notes and drafts Jobs emailed to himself, excerpts of letters and speeches, oral histories and interviews, photos and mementos. (Some physical copies are being produced for Apple and Disney employees, but that format won't be for sale to the general public.)

"Imagine yourself as an old person looking back on your life," Jobs wrote in a June 2005 email to himself as he was preparing to give the Stanford commencement speech. "Your life will be a story. It will be your story, with its highs and lows, its heros and villains, its forks in the road that mean everything." The book, published by the Steve Jobs Archive, will be released on Apple Books and the Steve Jobs Archive website. The fact that it aesthetically resembles an Apple product — mostly gray and white, minimalist — is no coincidence: It was designed by LoveFrom, the firm founded by Jony Ive, Apple's former chief design officer.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: It has been two years and four months since the first Apple Silicon Mac hit the market, and now Autodesk has finally updated some of its massively popular professional applications (AutoCAD and Maya) to run natively on M1 and M2 chips. The availability of AutoCAD for Mac 2024 was announced in a blog post on Autodesk's website on March 28. Like other major AutoCAD updates, it adds new features like expanded automation tools and easier workflows, but the announcement that "for the first time, AutoCAD for Mac 2024 and AutoCAD LT for Mac 2024 now run natively on both Intel and Apple Silicon architectures, including M1 and M2 chips in the M-series chips" is clearly the headlining feature.

Autodesk claims that Apple Silicon support "can increase overall performance by up to two times" compared to the 2023 version of AutoCAD. A day later, on March 29, Autodesk revealed the 2024 update for Maya, its 3D modeling software chiefly used in game development, film production, and visual effects. Maya 2024 brings native Apple Silicon support in addition to a slew of new features, including the LookDevX material editor, Hydra support, and so on. But in contrast to many other makers of widespread professional software in similar industries, such as Adobe and Unity, Autodesk's efforts to support Apple Silicon -- which were announced two years ago -- have been ongoing for an interminably long time. Even open source Maya competitor Blender beat Autodesk to the punch.