Encryption battle reignited as US govt at loggerheads with Apple

DefenceTalk.com ^

[FreedomPoster]

That too.

[Sarcasm Factory]

As I've said before, I've been strongly supportive of most of President Donald J. Trump's policies and actions. This is one of the regrettable exceptions. It's hard to say whether he simply doesn't understand what's at sake or whether he's just being a good populist politician who knows better than to even appear to side with "terrorists, child molesters, and drug traffickers." Frankly, Mr. Trump's behavior in general has been an atomic blast of pure sanity, and I have no intention whatsoever of losing a moment's sleep over an occasional blip of arguably poor judgement.

In any case, the courts appear to be on the ball about protecting the right to privacy against government snooping. Apple's upper management will mouth the usual words about appropriate cooperation while continuing to carefully avoid destroying public trust in the company's products and services. It's the same old dance. Onwards!

Late on Tuesday, President Donald Trump weighed in on Twitter, saying the government was helping Apple on trade issues “yet they refuse to unlock phones used by killers, drug dealers and other violent criminal elements.”

“They will have to step up to the plate and help our great Country, NOW!” he added.

[Swordmaker]

They weren't about to tell us the NSA had vacuumed up every bit and byte of voice and data that iPhone ever got or sent.

A $1,000,000.00 payment to an Israeli company to claim they "decrypted" the phone is dirt cheap to keep the BIG SECRET that NSA has all of your and my elevtronic communications on record.

After Snowden that was never something they needed to hide. We knew they were listening in at the carrier level and hoovering up everything that went in and out. That was NOT what they were after and not what they got.

The fact is that we know absolutely that the Israeli company, Cellebrite, did indeed hack into that iPhone because they started marketing the device that did it to other law enforcement and government agencies just a month after that, and evidence off of iPhones started being used in court in the following months. Another company, GreyKey, started selling a similar product four months later using a similar technique. Both paralleled each other. I’ve seen them demonstrated. They worked.

So your premise is flawed.

[null and void]

Another beautiful theory ruined by ugly facts.

[minnesota_bound]

Apple supports mass murderers.

[TheBattman]

Of all the Apple haters here on FR - who call them gay, fascist, etc... yet how many other big tech companies have gone to bad for your data privacy as seriously as Apple?

[TheBattman]

The last time this occurred, didn’t they just take the IPhone to some outfit in Israel who decoded it promptly.

Well, sort of. But those vulnerabilities were patched. The truth is - the Feds just hate it that anyone would expect their privacy to be protected. They want unfettered access like Google provides them (with a direct hardwire connection to their servers).

[TheBattman]

Apple was not in the business of creating and selling custom operating systems, so could not be compelled to do so. It also could not be compelled to create one that would damage its primary business.

Which is why Google CAN be compelled under a similar lawsuit. They DO product (or facilitate production) of a wide assortment of custom operating systems for various clients and platforms. Of course - Google doens't always even require a court order to turn over data on its users.

[TheBattman]

IN other words, the Feds want to force Apple to help them go on a fishing expedition?

[Drew68]

There were a lot of people trying to find a way to hack into iPhones during that period. A white-hat hacker found a way to do it and sold his method for a huge chunk of change to a company called Cellebrite in Israel. The amount I heard was north of $500,000. Cellebrite turned around and offered to unlock the terrorist’s iPhone 5C for the FBI for an undisclosed fee. . . Which later turned out to be $1,000,000. That was in early June. Seven months after the attack.

Has Apple fixed the flaw that allowed this hack?

[Sir_Ed]

I wonder if the fact that they haven’t cracked it yet is proof that the NSA doesn’t have working quantum computers yet? Or they do...but they just don’t want to expose that fact by cracking AES encryption with them?

[DiogenesLamp]

As I understand it, it isn’t a matter of holding firm, it’s that they literally do not have a back door into their systems. They are being asked to do something they cannot do.

I have not heard them say "we can't." It appears they are saying "we won't."