[simonh]

>Let's assume it's true: Does Apple have a choice other than cover-up?

Yes, they can state that they detected a hardware based security intrusion and have mitigated it.

Bear in mind according to the Bloomberg article the government and several other companies know all about this already as well. If the Bloomberg article is true there are thousands of these compromised motherboards out in the wild at multiple companies. There is no way on earth Apple could ever get away with a denial, so why do it?