CAn my icloud @me email have been hacked in 2015?

We’re not who needs to be convinced.

Not would anything here be convincing.

Is it possible that a previously-undetected hack or unauthorized access to an iPhone a decade ago sent a seriously creepy mail message? Yes.

Is it likely? Donno.

How y’all decide to resolve this matter is not a technical question.

Freddog187 wrote:

It may not be a technical question, but we’re looking for a technical solution. Do you happen to have one?

There isn’t a technical answer.

It’s possible this was an isolated and previously undetected hack sure, but that is also far from certain.

You’d need access to local and server logs, and backups, and metadata from ten years ago, and that effort would likely still be inconclusive. Assuming you can locate even some of that metadata, ten years on. (Maybe ask NSA if they have it? 😉) The purported hack may not have left any traces in the available metadata, too.

Or it was due to a malicious actor using a compromised passcode with an authorized device. That’ll also have no corroborating metadata decade on.

Or the message can be assumed to be real by the one person whose opinion actually matters here, the spouse.

More succinctly, looking for a technical solution to a people problem seldom works.