I want it to be clear, first of all, that I do not defend the hack against Apple (well, Apple was actually an indirect victim, since the infrastructure attacked was that of one of its suppliers) or any other company. Cybercriminal groups are a threat and a scourge. And I’m not in favor of companies neglecting their security, thus making things easier for cybercriminals. Everything, absolutely everything related to cybercrime and carelessness when it comes to security is undoubtedly bad.
However, it has always been said that of “A troubled river, fishermen’s profit”, and it seems that in this case the fishermen may be quite a few, because as far as we can read on Wccftech, the leaked documents would have reached the hands of independent technical services (that is, not linked to Apple through their official programs) and their information would have been very useful for them to better understand the architecture of the Cupertino devices.
In this way, and with the information leaked by the REvil group, the leaked documents are facilitating Mac repairs for technicians:
“Although hobbyists with a guide and a good set of tools can perform basic repairs, such as replacing a MacBook battery, logic boards are much more complex. They may require microscopic adjustments to circuits and chips. And the stakes couldn’t be higher – these are the components that determine whether someone can get your data back when things go terribly wrong. Many professionals, including those sponsored by Apple, cannot do this job. These can benefit immensely from schemes like the ones hacked by REvil«.
“Our business is built on leaks like these. This will help me to retrieve someone’s data. Someone is going to get your data back today because of this. You can’t go to Apple and say -I’ll give you $ 800,000 for giving me this information-«Said well-known YouTuber, repair advocate and owner of the Rossman Repair group. «When we fix the board, most of the time we keep the data. I’m not saying I’m in favor of people hacking computers to get this information. I would rather get this by going to Apple and giving them $ 1,000 each year to get this information«.
And it is that, indeed, only official technical services and associated with Apple have all the necessary information to repair their devices, and joining that club implies accepting some conditions that not all technical services want to accept. It is true that this last year Apple has accelerated and facilitated the incorporation of new technical services to its list of official services, but even so there are still many that are left out.
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