Gangs, drugs, and guns keep the pressure on Apple

Digital Trends ^ | April 9, 2016 | By Bruce Brown

[Swordmaker]

p>Apple’s issues with the Department of Justice and U.S. courts haven’t ended. The FBI was able to crack the San Bernadino, CA terrorist’s iPhone 5c with outside help and subsequently withdrew its legal action. U.S. District Courts in Boston and New York have ongoing investigations with gangs, guns, and drugs and the DoJ wants Apple’s help, as reported by  Yahoo! UK Finance.

Court papers were released Friday from a February 1 filing in Boston, during which a judge ordered Apple to unlock a phone seized from an alleged gang member.  This order took place before February 16, when Apple was asked to assist the FBI’s San Bernadino investigation. Apple refused to comply in both cases. The Justice Department took no further action on the Boston case, although according to a spokesperson, the DoJ could still act on the matter.

Related: Apple vs. the FBI: A complete timeline of the war over tech encryption

In New York on Friday, the Justice Department told a U.S. District Court it wants to access the phone contents of a confessed methamphetamine trafficker for guidance in sentencing. The DoJ stated that “the government continues to require Apple’s assistance in accessing the data that it is authorized to search by warrant.” Apple responded that in this case, it felt the government was jeopardizing encryption laws in an “attempt to set a troubling legal precedent and not really a pursuit of vital information for fighting crime.”

The continued court orders and Apple refusals are going on against a backdrop of proposed federal legislation. The Burr-Feinstein bill, named for its authors Senators Richard Burr and Dianne Feinstein, is still in draft mode, but a version was leaked Thursday night. The early version was called the “most ludicrous, dangerous, technically illiterate tech policy proposal of the 21st century,” by Kevin Bankston, director of the Open Technology Institute on Friday, according to Reuters. No one had to tell him not to hold back, it appears.

The balance of public safety and criminal and security investigations on one side and secure data and personal privacy on the other, continue to receive tremendous attention, and it doesn’t seem that the matter will be resolved anytime soon. As reported earlier this week, President Obama and his White House staff, while having strong mixed feelings, are not inclined even to comment, let alone affirm Burr-Feinstein because of the vagueness of the current bill and the prospect of politicizing a matter that effects national defense and security.

[JudgemAll]

They make us think this is a crime people problem when it is a government corruption problem. Cracking phones will do nothing so long the government workers going postal or turned terrorists in San Bernadino or Fort Hood are not vetted, inspected and forbiden from having locked phones. But since Hillary can keep setting up illegal private servers and government workers can benefit from government proof encryption without being tried for treason, this crap will go on whether Apple helps or not. In fact it will only get worse if Apple helped. But go tell a judge he is corrupt and his institution is corrupt, using the FBi and DEA as cursory sheep clothing do gooding plumbing operations at best, while the barn gates are wide open for all the rats and roaches.

[JudgemAll]

Imagine that. Without the spies and cracked cell phones, Obama would have not gotten Al Qaeda and Bin Laden, and IsiS and Al Nusra would have grown in Iraq and Afghanistan under the FBi/NSA aegis of Arab Spring... oh, wait a minute

[Swordmaker]

The Department of Justice is continuing trying to force Apple to unlock the iPhone 5S in New York, apparently not for more convictions as earlier reported but for help in recommending an appropriate sentence for Jun Feng the iPhone's owner who pled guilty in the drug case. Say what? Aren't there guidelines for such sentencing?

This is disingenuous because the guilty party will be long sentenced by the time the government's appeal will have wended its way through even the first level of appeal. Jun Feng is due for sentencing sometime before the end of April, giving no time for even preliminary filings of motions in the appeal to be filed in the slow appeal process.

There is no way that an appeal based on such an argument could possibly have any probative value in sentencing; there literally is no time for it to do so. In fact, since the miscreant copped a plea as part of plea bargain, it is normal that the length of sentence is already set as part of that bargain. That would make such a pleading in the appeal moot as it could not affect the outcome of any sentencing of which the judge has already agreed on. There is something else going on. — PING!

pinging dayglored, Shadow Ace, and ThunderSleeps for their ping list consideration.

Apple v. FBI/DOJ dispute escalation
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[Swordmaker]

Burr-Feinstein is totally disingenuous because the security measures Apple developed for its iPhones and iPads were developed under pressure from the US Government so they could be used by government agencies. Also the government wanted them to be Enterprise secure, which also required such hard encryption.

Where is the government going to get such absolutely secure devices for their purposes if they make all manufacturers install back doors? Keeping up with the technology that can crack such things requires huge investments which can only be paid for by consumer level sales. Apple complied by making the most secure devices on the planet and the thanks they get from the government is court orders to unlock them and Burr-Feinstein.

[Vendome]

I want to see proof they broke the encryption on the San Bernadino phone.

I don’t think they did and set up a PR scenario, to save face.

[Swordmaker]

I want to see proof they broke the encryption on the San Bernadino phone.

I don’t think they did and set up a PR scenario, to save face.

Very possible they did not. . . and also possible they did, as the security of that generation iPhone was not as iron clad (or silicon clad) as the later generations are. I've seen no evidence either way, other than lip service.