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It’s fascinating to see this story unfold. On one end you have Bloomberg doubling down on their claims, and here you have Apple making a move that shows their c

It’s fascinating to see this story unfold. On one end you have Bloomberg doubling down on their claims, and here you have Apple making a move that shows their confidence in their claims. For a while I was buying the subpoena theory, but this action clearly doesn’t fall under that, and they would be setting themselves up for serious liability / damage claims if it were true. Either there is some gross miscommunication going on inside Apple and Tim Cook is not properly informed - which is very unlikely at this point - or there might be less truth to Bloomberg’s story. The frustrating thing is, we’ll probably never know the answer.

fullshark 8y ago
Given the hack involves hardware I'm quite inclined to believe Apple and all the strong denials.
- manfredo 8y ago
  I concur. If it really is a chip being inserted on a board, then that's hard evidence that can be verified by cracking open the hardware and looking for said chip.
  - duskwuff 8y ago
    And Apple -- being, in part, a hardware company -- has extensive tools and expertise at their disposal to investigate any hardware abnormality. If they've concluded that everything is normal, I'm inclined to believe them.
    - munificent 8y ago
      Cook is claiming everything is normal, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's what Apple actually knows and believes. It is also possible that they have investigated, did find tampering, and are still publicly denying it.
      - CamperBob2 8y ago
        Cook has made this claim in a way that exposes the company, and probably himself, to a lot of legal grief if it later becomes evident that he's not being truthful. What does Bloomberg have at stake, in comparison? Nothing, apparently, since they don't seem to value their reputation enough to back up their reporting with evidence.
- panda888888 8y ago
  I believe the Bloomberg story because of their report that the malicious chip was originally found on hardware owned by Elemental, which at the time was a small startup company that had government clients. The hardware was found when Elemental was acquired by AWS and they did a more thorough hardware security review. Elemental would have been a good target because of their government clients but was/is not large enough to be noteworthy otherwise. This is where I trust the Bloomberg story. Saying, "Amazon, FB, Apple got hacked" is one thing. Including a then-200 person startup company in the mix is another. To me it serves as evidence that the hack was real.
parliament32 8y ago
>Tim Cook is not properly informed - which is very unlikely at this point Humor me, why is this unlikely? Why is it not possible that (whatever three letter agency) grabbed a few engineers, told them to do X without talking to anyone else, at the risk of them and their families getting disappeared to a black site? Besides, in security controlled jobs it's perfectly normal to not be allowed to disclose what you're working on even to your direct superior. This idea that Tim Cook / Apple PR must know everything that's going on at Apple is kinda ridiculous.
- fhood 8y ago
  Because Cook would have known about the results of the security audits that were performed.
  - appleiigs 8y ago
    Accounting has audits too and there is still accounting fraud, mis-statements, theft. We're commenting on Hacker News and we're believing that Tim is all knowing because of a security audit... against some malicious actor with the resources of a foreign state??
- noir_lord 8y ago
  That they must know everything is ridiculous, that they must be able to find out anything less so. If the CEO can't find out (almost -thinking medical stuff) anything by asking then that company has a problem as do it's shareholders.
- jmull 8y ago
  Well, who scrubbed the emails? Who scrubbed the data center record? And the financial records and shipping records? Who hid the motherboards? It’s going to take more than a couple engineers to cover this up completely. Also, if the consequence for talking about this is being disappeared, why weren’t the Bloomberg reporters disappeared some time during the year they were working on the story? And why exactly would a three letter agency do this to protect Apple? It just doesn’t make any sense.
user5994461 8y ago
There is no reason to believe than Tim Cook or any executive would be aware of anything. In large companies with a hundred thousand employees and contractors, barely anyone is aware of anything. Ask a thousand people about project something and they will assert in good faith that they have never heard of it. It doesn't mean that it doesn't exist, just that you didn't find the handful of people who knows about it.
- appleiigs 8y ago
  I'm flabbergasted that you are being downvoted. I have the same opinion as you, but to the point where i think it's almost fact... executives at a company that size (# of employees) don't know anything. It's up to Bloomberg to prove their hypothesis is true, but don't see how Apple can say it's without a doubt untrue.
  - rconti 8y ago
    You mean, there haven't been a few weeks for someone, ANYONE at Apple to say "hey, Tim, you know, about that hack..."
    - appleiigs 8y ago
      I bet there aren't many people who have access to Tim. And not many people who have access to people who have access to Tim, and so on.
- macspoofing 8y ago
  >There is no reason to believe than Tim Cook or any executive would be aware of anything. The minute this story hit publication you can bet internal security teams at Apple would have validated it and submitted findings to Tim Cook. At this point Tim Cook, along with his legal team, has all the facts as they pertain to Apple and Apple suppliers and every component inside Apple devices. You don't come out without a strong denial like that unless you are sure you can back it up.
  - 8y ago

fullshark 8y ago

Given the hack involves hardware I'm quite inclined to believe Apple and all the strong denials.

manfredo 8y ago
I concur. If it really is a chip being inserted on a board, then that's hard evidence that can be verified by cracking open the hardware and looking for said chip.
- duskwuff 8y ago
  And Apple -- being, in part, a hardware company -- has extensive tools and expertise at their disposal to investigate any hardware abnormality. If they've concluded that everything is normal, I'm inclined to believe them.
  - munificent 8y ago
    Cook is claiming everything is normal, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's what Apple actually knows and believes. It is also possible that they have investigated, did find tampering, and are still publicly denying it.
    - CamperBob2 8y ago
      Cook has made this claim in a way that exposes the company, and probably himself, to a lot of legal grief if it later becomes evident that he's not being truthful. What does Bloomberg have at stake, in comparison? Nothing, apparently, since they don't seem to value their reputation enough to back up their reporting with evidence.
panda888888 8y ago
I believe the Bloomberg story because of their report that the malicious chip was originally found on hardware owned by Elemental, which at the time was a small startup company that had government clients. The hardware was found when Elemental was acquired by AWS and they did a more thorough hardware security review. Elemental would have been a good target because of their government clients but was/is not large enough to be noteworthy otherwise. This is where I trust the Bloomberg story. Saying, "Amazon, FB, Apple got hacked" is one thing. Including a then-200 person startup company in the mix is another. To me it serves as evidence that the hack was real.

parliament32 8y ago

>Tim Cook is not properly informed - which is very unlikely at this point Humor me, why is this unlikely? Why is it not possible that (whatever three letter agency) grabbed a few engineers, told them to do X without talking to anyone else, at the risk of them and their families getting disappeared to a black site? Besides, in security controlled jobs it's perfectly normal to not be allowed to disclose what you're working on even to your direct superior. This idea that Tim Cook / Apple PR must know everything that's going on at Apple is kinda ridiculous.

fhood 8y ago
Because Cook would have known about the results of the security audits that were performed.
- appleiigs 8y ago
  Accounting has audits too and there is still accounting fraud, mis-statements, theft. We're commenting on Hacker News and we're believing that Tim is all knowing because of a security audit... against some malicious actor with the resources of a foreign state??
noir_lord 8y ago
That they must know everything is ridiculous, that they must be able to find out anything less so. If the CEO can't find out (almost -thinking medical stuff) anything by asking then that company has a problem as do it's shareholders.
jmull 8y ago
Well, who scrubbed the emails? Who scrubbed the data center record? And the financial records and shipping records? Who hid the motherboards? It’s going to take more than a couple engineers to cover this up completely. Also, if the consequence for talking about this is being disappeared, why weren’t the Bloomberg reporters disappeared some time during the year they were working on the story? And why exactly would a three letter agency do this to protect Apple? It just doesn’t make any sense.

user5994461 8y ago

There is no reason to believe than Tim Cook or any executive would be aware of anything. In large companies with a hundred thousand employees and contractors, barely anyone is aware of anything. Ask a thousand people about project something and they will assert in good faith that they have never heard of it. It doesn't mean that it doesn't exist, just that you didn't find the handful of people who knows about it.

appleiigs 8y ago
I'm flabbergasted that you are being downvoted. I have the same opinion as you, but to the point where i think it's almost fact... executives at a company that size (# of employees) don't know anything. It's up to Bloomberg to prove their hypothesis is true, but don't see how Apple can say it's without a doubt untrue.
- rconti 8y ago
  You mean, there haven't been a few weeks for someone, ANYONE at Apple to say "hey, Tim, you know, about that hack..."
  - appleiigs 8y ago
    I bet there aren't many people who have access to Tim. And not many people who have access to people who have access to Tim, and so on.
macspoofing 8y ago
>There is no reason to believe than Tim Cook or any executive would be aware of anything. The minute this story hit publication you can bet internal security teams at Apple would have validated it and submitted findings to Tim Cook. At this point Tim Cook, along with his legal team, has all the facts as they pertain to Apple and Apple suppliers and every component inside Apple devices. You don't come out without a strong denial like that unless you are sure you can back it up.
- 8y ago