Late last week, we reported on the newest leak from Edward Snowden, indicating that the NSA had hacked the SIM cards of pretty much every smartphone on Earth. iPhones included.
It looked bad. The hack allowed the NSA to tap into your phone without a court order. But today, the Dutch company responsible for 2 billion SIM cards released a statement, saying that as far as they can tell, fears of a massive NSA invasion are overblown.
Although Gemalto, the company in question, says it is still investigating the matter, they’re now saying that at first glance, the supposed hack is a non-issue. Here’s their initial statement on the matter:
Gemalto, the world leader in digital security, is devoting the necessary resources to investigate and understand the scope of such sophisticated techniques. Initial conclusions already indicate that Gemalto SIM products (as well as banking cards, passports and other products and platforms) are secure and the Company doesn’t expect to endure a significant financial prejudice.
Gemalto says they will be releasing their full findings on Wednesday. They invite security experts to look them over, to make sure they haven’t missed anything.
It’s hard to tell what this means, so far. Gemalto doesn’t deny the hack, so the question is, was Snowden’s information on the matter overblown, have the SIM cards in questions cycled out of circulation, or is there some other wrinkle we’re not aware of yet? I guess we’ll know Wednesday.
Source: Gemalto
