iPhone 17 / Courtesy of Apple
On Wednesday, Chinese authorities revealed that high-risk vulnerabilities have been discovered in Apple’s proprietary operating systems, including iPhone Operating System (iOS) and others.
The Network Security Threat and Vulnerability Information Sharing Platform (NVDB) of China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released monitoring results indicating that critical vulnerabilities exceeding acceptable thresholds were found in Apple’s iOS, iPadOS, and macOS. The report stated that these vulnerabilities are already being exploited in cyberattacks.
Authorities explained that these vulnerabilities could lead to memory corruption when processing image files. They noted that Apple has already patched the vulnerability and issued a security advisory. The NVDB strongly recommends that relevant organizations and users immediately evaluate potential risks and promptly update to the latest secure version to mitigate cybersecurity threats.
Interestingly, this cybersecurity warning from Chinese authorities coincided with the launch of Apple’s new iPhone 17.
On Tuesday, Apple unveiled its latest smartphone lineup, including the iPhone 17. The new model has drawn attention for offering increased memory capacity at the same price as its predecessor. In China, the 256GB version of the iPhone 17 is priced at 5,999 CNY (about 842 USD), matching the cost of the 128GB iPhone 16.
China, one of the initial markets for the iPhone 17 release, will begin pre-orders on Friday, with official sales commencing on September 19.