Your Apple iPhone could be hacked by a simple message, update now!

A Google Project Zero security researcher has found multiple bugs in Apple’s iMessage platform that will allow a hacker to remotely hack into an iPhone with just a message.

Natalie Silvanovich, the researcher in question, presented her findings at the Black Hat security conference in Las Vegas on 7 August. Silvanovich’s work focused on interaction-less bugs, which are bugs that allow a device to be exploited without user interaction. Hackers would normally require a user to perform some action in order to start hacking them. This could be something like downloading a video, tapping on a link, etc. With interaction-less bugs, a user does nothing and the phone can still be compromised.

[caption id=“attachment_7136291” align=“alignnone” width=“1280”] A hacker only needs to send a message to steal your data.[/caption]

The issues she found affect only iMessages and not SMS or MMS, but they’re still a little disturbing. A hacker would only need to send a special message to a phone to extract data from the iMessage app. A user need not even open the app for the data to be stolen.

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According to Wired, there are also other bugs that allow hackers to run code via a simple message. The report states that while the exploits aren’t public yet, they could be worth millions to the right buyer, which could include nation-state hackers and security firms with ties to law enforcement.

If you’re using an Apple device, simply make sure you’ve updated to macOS 10.14.6 and iOS 12.4 in order to protect yourself from these attacks.