Apple says it is releasing updates early in response to AI cybersecurity concerns

Apple said it is pushing forward a series of software updates that would previously have been bundled with a new version of its iOS operating system, making them available earlier than in previous cycles in response to AI-driven security concerns.

The company told Reuters on Monday it was adapting to the reality that, given the ability of artificial intelligence to speed the development of malicious hacking tools, it needed to reduce the time between when updates were first made public and when they were put into customers' hands.

The shift marks a notable change in Apple's longstanding practice of packaging security fixes with broader software releases, an acknowledgment that AI is compressing the window attackers need to exploit known flaws.

Unless security experts discover a hacking campaign targeting a previously unknown software flaw, Apple usually releases security updates as part of a move from one version of iOS to the next, for example from the currently available version - 26.5 - to the next planned update, 26.6. In the interim, developers and other testers trial the next update to iron out any kinks.

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The company said that, instead, the latest round of security updates were being made available to everyone ahead of the wider release of 26.6.

It said that while there was no evidence that any of the newly patched vulnerabilities had been taken advantage of, the time between the point when security fixes were first announced and when they were deployed to customers' phones needed to be compressed.