Security News > 2024 > July > 'Almost every Apple device' vulnerable to CocoaPods supply chain attack
EVA claims CocoaPods in 2014 migrated all "Pods" - a file describing a project's dependencies - to a new "Trunk server" on GitHub.
CocoaPods authenticates new devices using an email sent to users who request a session, the researchers noted - but authentication doesn't rely on anything but a client verifying their email address by clicking a link.
"We have found that almost every Pod owner is registered with their organizational email on the Trunk server, which makes them vulnerable to our zero-click takeover vulnerability," warned the EVA team.
The researchers noted that they actually used the method "To take over the owner accounts of some of the most popular CocoaPods packages," which "We could have used for highly damaging supply chain attacks that could impact the entire Apple ecosystem."
CocoaPods maintainers contacted by The Register didn't respond to questions before publication.
The researchers recommend everyone using CocoaPods review their dependencies for orphaned Pods, perform checksum validations on all code downloaded from the CocoaPods Trunk server, review all third-party code, update their CocoaPods installations and generally be more attentive to open source software supply chain risks.
News URL
Related news
- Apple fixes zero-day exploited in 'extremely sophisticated' attacks (source)
- Apple warns 'extremely sophisticated attack' may be targeting iThings (source)
- Apple fixes zero-day flaw exploited in “extremely sophisticated” attack (CVE-2025-24200) (source)
- North Korea targets crypto developers via NPM supply chain attack (source)
- Bybit Hack Traced to Safe{Wallet} Supply Chain Attack Exploited by North Korean Hackers (source)
- China-Linked Silk Typhoon Expands Cyber Attacks to IT Supply Chains for Initial Access (source)
- Apple fixes WebKit zero-day exploited in ‘extremely sophisticated’ attacks (source)
- Apple Releases Patch for WebKit Zero-Day Vulnerability Exploited in Targeted Attacks (source)
- GitHub supply chain attack spills secrets from 23,000 projects (source)
- Supply chain attack on popular GitHub Action exposes CI/CD secrets (source)