Apple has released a security update to fix a critical new vulnerability that affects iPhone, iPad and Mac owners. The flaw is a zero-day vulnerability that, in short, is as bad as possible.
For those who don’t know, a zero-day vulnerability refers to a bug in software that hackers are already aware of. That means the problem is not just academic – instead, every day that goes by without the security fix, you become open to scammers who are using the problem to take advantage of people worldwide.
Zero-day vulnerabilities are a race against time to get as many people as possible to apply the patch.
Apple devices affected by the new bug include iPhone 6s or newer, all iPad Pro models, iPad Air 2 or newer, iPad mini 4 or newer, iPad 5th generation or newer, and iPad Touch (seventh generation ). MacBooks, iMac, Mac Pro, and Mac mini computers with macOS Big Sur also need to be updated to the new update – all of these devices are vulnerable.
“Apple is aware of a report that this problem may have been actively exploited,” the Californian company confirmed in a safety briefing released today. The vulnerability, internally identified by Apple as CVE-2021-30807, is a memory corruption issue.
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Little is known about the bug, however. That is quite normal in such situations. Since Apple has confirmed that hackers are using the memory corruption bug to attack devices in the real world, holding back details on this issue is a good tactic to prevent more evil actors from finding out about the problem – and taking advantage of unpatched devices .
We’d expect to see more details in the coming months, as the update is being installed by around a billion iPhone owners worldwide.
To update your iPhone to the latest version of iOS, go to Settings> General> Software update. iOS 14.7.1 is the version that you need to install to ensure that your smartphone is protected against the zero-day bug. iPad owners need to download iPadOS 14.7.1, while Mac owners need macOS Big Sur 11.5.1.
All three of these new software updates from Apple are now available in the UK and worldwide.
