Apple Developer Website Hacked: Developer Names, Addresses May Have Been Taken

developerIn an email to developers today, Apple revealed that its Developer Center website was breached by unknown hackers and was taken offline last Thursday as a precaution.

The company notes that sensitive personal information was "encrypted and cannot be accessed" but that Apple's engineers "could not rule out the possibility" that developer names, mailing addresses and email addresses may have been accessed.

Apple says it is overhauling its developer systems, updating software and rebuilding the entire developer database. There is no indication of when the site will be back up, other than the company saying it expects to have it up again soon.

Apple Developer Website Update

Last Thursday, an intruder attempted to secure personal information of our registered developers from our developer website. Sensitive personal information was encrypted and cannot be accessed, however, we have not been able to rule out the possibility that some developers’ names, mailing addresses, and/or email addresses may have been accessed. In the spirit of transparency, we want to inform you of the issue. We took the site down immediately on Thursday and have been working around the clock since then.

In order to prevent a security threat like this from happening again, we’re completely overhauling our developer systems, updating our server software, and rebuilding our entire database. We apologize for the significant inconvenience that our downtime has caused you and we expect to have the developer website up again soon.

Apple told Macworld that the breached server was not associated with any customer information and that all personal information is encrypted -- additionally, the attackers did not get access to any app code or to any servers where app information is stored.

Popular Stories

Apple iPhone 16e Feature

Apple Announces iPhone 16e With A18 Chip and Apple Intelligence, Pricing Starts at $599

Wednesday February 19, 2025 8:02 am PST by
Apple today introduced the iPhone 16e, its newest entry-level smartphone. The device succeeds the third-generation iPhone SE, which has now been discontinued. The iPhone 16e features a larger 6.1-inch OLED display, up from a 4.7-inch LCD on the iPhone SE. The display has a notch for Face ID, and this means that Apple no longer sells any iPhones with a Touch ID fingerprint button, marking the ...
iphone 17 pro asherdipps

iPhone 17 Pro Models Rumored to Feature Aluminum Frame Instead of Titanium Frame

Tuesday February 18, 2025 12:02 pm PST by
Over the years, Apple has switched from an aluminum frame to a stainless steel frame to a titanium frame for its highest-end iPhones. And now, it has been rumored that Apple will go back to using aluminum for three out of four iPhone 17 models. In an investor note with research firm GF Securities, obtained by MacRumors this week, Apple supply chain analyst Jeff Pu said the iPhone 17, iPhone...
apple launch feb 2025 alt

Here Are the New Apple Products We're Still Expecting This Spring

Thursday February 20, 2025 5:06 am PST by
Now that Apple has announced its new more affordable iPhone 16e, our thoughts turn to what else we are expecting from the company this spring. There are three product categories that we are definitely expecting to get upgraded before spring has ended. Keep reading to learn what they are. If we're lucky, Apple might make a surprise announcement about a completely new product category. M4...
iPhone 17 Roundup Feature 2

iPhone Design to Change 'Significantly' This Year

Monday February 17, 2025 7:09 am PST by
Apple is set to "significantly change" the iPhone's design language later this year, according to a Weibo leaker. In a new post, the user known "Digital Chat Station" said that the iPhone's design is "starting to change significantly" this year. The "iPhone 17 Air" reportedly features a "horizontal, bar-shaped" design on the rear, likely referring to an elongated camera bump. On the other...
apple launch feb 2025

Tim Cook Teases an 'Apple Launch' Next Wednesday

Thursday February 13, 2025 8:07 am PST by
In a social media post today, Apple CEO Tim Cook teased an upcoming "launch" of some kind scheduled for Wednesday, February 19. "Get ready to meet the newest member of the family," he said, with an #AppleLaunch hashtag. The post includes a short video with an animated Apple logo inside a circle. Cook did not provide an exact time for the launch, or share any other specific details, so...
Generic iOS 18

Here's When Apple Will Release iOS 18.4

Wednesday February 19, 2025 11:38 am PST by
Following the launch of the iPhone 16e, Apple updated its iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia pages to give a narrower timeline on when the next updates are set to launch. All three pages now state that new Apple Intelligence features and languages will launch in early April, an update from the more broader April timeframe that Apple provided before. The next major point updates will be iOS ...
iOS 18

iOS 18.4 Coming Next Week With These New Features for Your iPhone

Friday February 14, 2025 6:18 am PST by
The first iOS 18.4 beta for iPhones should be just around the corner, and the update is expected to include many new features and changes. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman expects the iOS 18.4 beta to be released by next week. Below, we outline what to expect from iOS 18.4 so far. Apple Intelligence for Siri Siri is expected to get several enhancements powered by Apple Intelligence on iOS...
Apple 2025 Thumb 1

Two of Apple's Oldest Products Are Finally Getting Updated This Year

Friday February 14, 2025 6:03 am PST by
Apple released the HomePod mini in November 2020, followed by the AirTag in May 2021, and both still remain first-generation products. Fortunately, rumors suggest that both the HomePod mini and the AirTag will finally be updated at some point this year. Below, we recap rumors about the HomePod mini 2 and AirTag 2. HomePod mini 2 In January 2025, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said Apple is ...

Top Rated Comments

WolfSnap Avatar
151 months ago
News reporting would go something like this...

Of the Apple hacking, which didn't really affect much, and is actively being resolved:
Apple completely compromised!

Of the Android master key exploit which exposes 900 million phones to malware/viruses and more, and has no chance of ever being resolved:
<chirp><chirp><chirp>
Score: 43 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Snowshiro Avatar
151 months ago
I'm not normally one to step up and defend Apple, but in this case, sadly this is how things are now.

Facebook has been hacked, Twitter has been hacked, Sony has been hacked, Zendesk has been hacked, Microsoft has been hacked, Ubuntu has been hacked, numerous government websites have been hacked etc. etc.

It's simply next to impossible these days to guarantee security in the millions of lines of code that constitute modern Operating Systems and the dozens of processes that run on them. Someone will find a vulnerability sooner or later and exploit it. The only thing you can do is make it as hard as possible for them, and store your data in as safe a manner as possible with strong encryption (and hashing for passwords).

This was going to happen sooner or later, and while it looks bad for Apple, it's a fact of life that there are people out there for whom hacking is their job and how they earn their money. The only way to secure your data from hacking, is not to put it on the internet. End of story.
Score: 26 Votes (Like | Disagree)
TheFithBeatle Avatar
151 months ago
oh dam

this will hit news stations like a frenzy, android users are gonna gloat
Score: 18 Votes (Like | Disagree)
WhackyNinja Avatar
151 months ago
Travel back in Time and stop this NOW!

Fixed point in time it cant be changed! ITS ALL JUST WIBBLY WOBBLY TIMEY WIMEY
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Zaqfalcon Avatar
151 months ago
Do developer names, mailing addresses and email addresses, not constitute sensitive?
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
gnasher729 Avatar
151 months ago
Why didn't you do this as routine maintenance to prevent anything like this from happening to this severity? Sure you can't make it 100% immune from attacks, but you could make the data 98% safe.
It seems you don't have much experience building secure websites. What you do is building security in depth. You make sure nobody can get in, and you make sure there's nothing to see if somebody gets in. You always assume that someone _might_ figure out how to get around one defense, and have a second defense in place. That's what Apple did, and it worked. Most likely the attacker didn't get access to anything, and what there was to access was encrypted.

If you knew of ways to get past one of the defences, you would of course fix it. Somebody got in, which means they used a method that wasn't anticipated and couldn't have been fixed. Because of "security in depth", that breach didn't gain the attacker anything, but now Apple knows what they did and makes the necessary changes. It is quite possible that Apple's security developers have from time to time found possible attacks and quietly fixed them; you wouldn't notice it.

----------

Why didn't these hackers go after the NSA? They already have all Apple Dev Center data and lots more..
That's of course nonsense, and you know that. And if it was true, you wouldn't go after the NSA. You go after someone who can't lock you away for the rest of your sad life without a court case.


this shows that apple is no longer reliable and it may affect stocks greatly.
There goes the public trust...Apple....
Nonsense. There's security in depth in place. Someone got past one defense, was promptly detected, and other defenses stopped him. Exactly how it is supposed to work. Public trust is also based on how a company handles problems: Apple handled it by immediately shutting down the site, which is inconvenient, but the absolutely safe thing to do, and they promptly informed the affected people about what was going on. Others companies would have kept the site running, hoping that nothing else happens. That's the companies you can't trust.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)