Russia has accused Apple of closely cooperating with US spy agencies.
Russia has accused Apple of working with US spy agencies
The nation's Federal Security Service (FSB) claims to have uncovered an American espionage operation that involved compromising thousands of iPhones with sophisticated surveillance software.
In a statement, the service said: "The FSB has uncovered an intelligence action of the American special services using Apple mobile devices."
The service argues that the plot showed "close cooperation" between the tech giant and the National Security Agency (NSA) - the American agency responsible for cryptographic and communications intelligence and security.
The FSB did not provide any evidence to suggest that Apple had cooperated with, or had any knowledge of, the alleged spying campaign targeting its products.
The tech behemoth also issued a statement denying the Russian allegations.
Apple said: "We have never worked with any government to insert a backdoor into any Apple product and we never will."
The FSB suggested that several thousand Apple devices in Russia had been infected, including those of ordinary users and foreign diplomats based in Russia and countries that were formerly a part of the Soviet Union.
The Moscow-based cryptocurrency company Kaspersky Lab says that dozens of employees' devices have been compromised.
The Kremlin-linked firm said in a blog post: "The attack is carried out using an invisible iMessage with a malicious attachment, which, using a number of vulnerabilities in the iOS operating system, is executed on a device and installs spyware.
"The deployment of the spyware is completely hidden and requires no action from the user.
"The spyware then quietly transmits private information to remote servers: microphone recordings, photos from instant messengers, geolocation, and data about a number of other activities of the owner of the infected device."