Canberra: A Canadian research organisation by the name of Citizen Lab has charged Israeli surveillance company NSO Group with using at least three novel techniques to break into iPhones in 2016.

The so-called FINDMYPWN, PWNYOURHOME, and LATENTIMAGE procedures allegedly targeted Mexican civil society members, including human rights organisations.

It appears that NSO Group was successful in getting around Apple's security measures to install spyware for real-time monitoring.

Also Read: Musk working on 'TruthGPT' as ChatGPT alternative

The deployment of spyware was discovered by Citizen Lab last year during a joint investigation with the Mexican NGO Red en Defensa de los Derechos Digitales.

Members of the human rights organisation Centro PRODH, which in Mexico represents victims of military abuse, were listed among the victims.

Later investigations, according to Citizen Lab, revealed that civil society targets were being targeted globally.

According to reports, NSO Group hacked Apple devices on behalf of its customers using zero-click exploit chains.

Also Read: Adobe to add Artificial Intelligence tools into its video editing software

When zero-click techniques are employed, malware can spread to devices even when users do not click on malicious links.

According to reports, NSO installed its Pegasus spyware on the victims' devices in order to steal information and monitor them in real time using the cameras and microphones.

Customers of NSO Group allegedly used at least three zero-click iOS 15 and iOS 16 exploit chains against targets in the global civil society.

On January 17, 2022, Citizen Lab discovered the first zero-click exploit (LATENTIMAGE) on a single target's smartphone running iOS version 15.1.1.

This hack only required one step and is thought to have involved the iPhone's Find My feature.

FINDMYPWN was the second zero-click. As of June 2022, it was used against iOS 15. According to reports, the exploit involves two steps, the first of which targets the iPhone's Find My feature and the second of which targets iMessage.

Beginning in October 2022, the third zero-click, PWNYOURHOME, was applied to iOS 15 and iOS 16. It was also a two-step hack that went after iMessage and HomeKit.

Also Read: Starship rocket system's first space launch is scheduled by SpaceX

According to Citizen Lab, iOS 16 users who had Lockdown Mode enabled temporarily saw real-time alerts when PWNYOURHOME was being used to hack their devices. Whether NSO Group discovered a hole is unknown.

The Cupertino tech giant introduced Lockdown Mode last year to give users who might be the target of spyware increased security.