Meltdown and Spectre, the bugs affecting most chips have hit Apple as well. In an announcement, the tech major has said that all iPhones, iPads and Mac computers are affected by the two major flaws in computer chips.
Intel confirmed a potential security flaw in its chips causing all tech majors to rush to fix the bugs through emergency updates to supported versions.
As per reports, the security bug, if used for malicious purposes, has the potential to improperly gather sensitive data from computing devices.
BBC reports that Apple said it had already released some patches but there was no evidence of the vulnerability being exploited. it had already released "mitigations" against Meltdown in its latest iPhones and iPad operating system update - iOS 11.2 and the macOS 10.12.2 for its MacBooks and iMacs.
It also advised all users to download software only from trusted sources and avoid malicious apps.
In fact, Mac devices have always believed to be less vulnerable to viruses and security issues as compared to Android of Microsoft operating systems.
But given the Metldown and Spectre flaws being found in every new processing units made by Intel and ARM, nearly every single computer could be affected.
However, Apple Watch may not be affected by ‘Meltdown’ since an Intel chip isn’t used in that device.
Apple also announced that it will be releasing patches for Spectre in the form of an update to web browser Safari in a few days.
Soon after the secutiry flaw was discovered, Microsoft rushed to issue updates.
"We're aware of this industry-wide issue and have been working closely with chip manufacturers to develop and test mitigations to protect our customers. We are in the process of deploying mitigations to cloud services and have also released security updates to protect Windows customers against vulnerabilities affecting supported hardware chips from Intel, ARM, and AMD," Microsoft said in a statement to The Verge.
Google too has issues a statement informing users that its Android phones were protected it users had the latest security updates.