Rajeev Chandrasekhar Rebuts Washington Post's ‘Half Facts’ On iPhone Hacking Allegations

Minister of State Rajeev Chandrasekhar denied allegations made by The Washington Post that the Indian government targeted Apple over reported hacking concerns for independent journalists and opposition politicians.

Taking to X, he said, “Rebutting @washingtonpost's terrible storytelling is tiresome, but someone has to do it. This story is half facts, fully embellished."

A story published on Wednesday in collaboration with Amnesty International by The Washington Post stated that specific journalists had experienced targeting with spyware on their iPhones, with the most recent case identified in October.

Chandrasekhar said it was for Apple to explain if their mobile phones were vulnerable and what triggered the alert.

He added that Apple had been asked to join a probe by the authorities over the alerts and several meetings had been held.

In October, several Opposition politicians like Mahua Moitra, Raghav Chadha, Priyanka Chaturvedi, were notified of potential state-sponsored hacks on their mobile phones.

Following the ensuing controversy in India, Apple released a statement clarifying that the company did not attribute threat notifications to any particular state-sponsored attacker.