Can iPads get spywares?

Haven’t we already answered this question? You marked your earlier post as “Solved” - awarding this attribute to our colleague ProustGiulio.

As I have previously explained, in some considerable detail, your iPad is unlikely to have been “infected” (in the traditional damaging sense) with malware. Files that you have downloaded may themselves be infected with malware, but the malware itself should not be able to execute on, or propagate from the iPad without manual assistance.

There are no AV scanner products for iPad. Due to the sandbox architecture of the iPad, any such product would be inefective.

You should be able to identify any file that you have downloaded to your iPad using the native Files App. From here, the file can be deleted.

To self propagate, malware must be able to execute (i.e., “run”) a process on the host computer.

iOS/iPadOS will only run executable processes that are digitally “signed”. Without delving into to the technical complexities, digital (certificate) signing will prevent computer code from running unless the digital signature can be verified as genuine.

As such, malware is very unlikely to have a verifiable signing signature - unless the originator of the malware has very cleverly managed to fool Apple into signing the code. This situation is very rare, but has been known to occur.

In the unlikely event that malware does run on the iPad, the system architecture restricts the process to only being able to access processes (and files) within its own sandbox; therefore the malware cannot infect other resources outside of the sandbox within which it is running. As a consequence, malware should not be able to infect other files on the iPad.

It is impossible to provide absolute and categoric assurance that infection cannot occur. Whilst the system iPad system architecture is designed to inhibit infection by (or propagation of) malware, no computer system ever designed can provide total protection.

However, if your iPad is up-to-date and running the highest supported version of iOS/iPadOS that your model of iPad can support, it is highly unlikely that other files on your device will be infected by malware.

Subject to having an a fully updated iPad, for practical purposes, infection of other files can be reasonably excluded from concern.

You are welcome. I hope the additional insight and guidance was helpful to understanding both the risk and protections offered by iOS/iPadOS.

I strongly recommend use of the protective measures that I described in the earlier thread. Implementing them cannot prevent download of an infected file - but will significantly reduce the likelihood of connecting with internet resources that host malicious content - or other threats that do pose significant risk to the security of your device.

Marking the post as solved may indeed reduce the likelihood of seeing additional responses - as contributors may perceive the thread as having been resolved to the satisfaction of the OP (Original Poster). I believe that my initial reply to your question was posted either after - or perhaps just before - you marked your post as resolved.

As a point of clarification, as I hope to have thoroughly and effectively explained, whilst a malware infected file is unlikely to infect or cause direct issue to your iPad - the file itself is still infected with malware. If the infected file is subsequently transferred from the iPad to a computer that is susceptible to the malware payload, the file still presents risk/threat to other computer systems.