Bugging communication devices has long been a government / law enforcement tactic, mostly enabled by telcos via ITU, which since its inception has been a willing collaborator.

Ex A: Ind x ITU, https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/india-itu-res...

Ex B: China x ITU, https://datatracker.ietf.org/liaison/1677/

It has been, but getting Apple to do it was dumb. They could've just used a government app that everyone has to use, and put the bugging in there.

this glosses over the point that they could have just accomplished that with already effectively required UPI apps