Apple Yanks Infected Apps After Malware Hits App Store

The App Store suffers its first major hack.

Paul Sakuma / AP

Hackers have finally managed to infiltrate Apple's App Store.

On Monday, Apple confirmed that dozens of apps infected with malware had been unwittingly published to the App Store.

The apps had been built by developers who were duped into downloading counterfeit versions of a program called Xcode, Apple's software for building iOS apps. When developers compiled apps with the bogus tool, it embedded malignant code in them and did so well enough that infected apps made it through Apple's strict review process.

According to cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks, some 39 apps were affected including some that are wildly popular in China, like messaging app WeChat and ride-hailing app Didi Kuaidi.

Alerted to the malware, Apple began purging apps affected by it from the App Store. "We've removed the apps from the App Store that we know have been created with this counterfeit software," said Apple spokeswoman Christine Monaghan. "We are working with the developers to make sure they're using the proper version of Xcode to rebuild their apps."

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