Apple denies iCloud security breach in celebrity nude photo scandal

A failure in iCloud’s security system was not to blame for this week’s celebrity photo leak, Apple has claimed.

It has confirmed that the photos of people such as Jennifer Lawrence were obtained from their iCloud accounts. However, this occurred due to their passwords being compromised and not as a result of any security failing of its systems, it says.

We wanted to provide an update to our investigation into the theft of photos of certain celebrities,” a statement read. When we learned of the theft, we were outraged and immediately mobilized Apple’s engineers to discover the source. Our customers’ privacy and security are of utmost importance to us.

After more than 40 hours of investigation, we have discovered that certain celebrity accounts were compromised by a very targeted attack on user names, passwords and security questions, a practice that has become all too common on the Internet.

None of the cases we have investigated has resulted from any breach in any of Apple’s systems including iCloud or Find my iPhone. We are continuing to work with law enforcement to help identify the criminals involved.

To protect against this type of attack, we advise all users to always use a strong password and enable two-step verification.”

Apple will next week unveil the iPhone 6 and possibly some sort of wearable Apple device.