'Turkish Crime Family' Claims To Have Hacked 200 Million iCloud Accounts, Threatens To Wipe Them If Not Paid Ransom

On March 23, 2017, it was reported that a Turkish hacking group calling itself the "Turkish Crime Family" claimed to have secured the details of about 200 million iCloud accounts, and that if Apple didn't pay $75,000 in bitcoin (or $100,000 in iTunes gift cards), it would wipe the accounts. However, Apple told Naked Security that there had not been any breaches into the Apple system, including iCloud and Apple ID. They alleged that the list of purported emails and passwords had been obtained from previously compromised third-party services.

Turkish Crime Family is said to be new on the hacking scene, having formed in Istanbul but now resident in Green Lanes, north London. Still, there are many questions about whether the threat from this group is actually real.