14 DAY TRIAL // According to Apple's statement published by The Loop, the YiSpecter iOS malware we reported on yesterday does not affect the users that run at least iOS 8.4 on their devices.
As Apple said in their message regarding YiSpecter, "this issue only impacts users on older versions of iOS who have also downloaded malware from untrusted sources. We addressed this specific issue in iOS 8.4 and we have also blocked the identified apps that distribute this malware."
Given that the applications affected by YiSpecter were also blocked from the iOS App Store, users do not have to take any measures to protect themselves from this malware piece other than downloading apps only from trusted sources (i.e. Apple's App Store).
As Apple recommends in the statement they send to The Loop, and as good security practices also advise, users should also keep their device's operating system up to date to avoid being affected by security issues and bugs fixed by Apple in the newer iOS releases.
Users that run iOS 8.4 or later on their device and install apps from the App Store should not worry
Moreover, even though as we've seen all throughout the XcodeGhost saga, apps downloaded from the iOS App Store are not always clean, one should also only download applications from the App Store to decrease the chance of installing malware ridden apps.
YiSpecter is an iOS malware that was capable of infecting both jailbroken and non-jailbroken iOS devices, the first occurrence of such behavior until now. YiSpecter is also the first malware affecting Apple's iOS capable of abusing private APIs to embed malicious functionalities within iOS apps.
As we already reported, YiSpecter only affected users from Taiwan and mainland China, but even though it was infecting apps and iOS devices left and right for about 10 months, a single anti-malware product of the 57 available on the VirusTotal was capable of detecting on the day of Palo Alto Networks' initial report.