US accuses Apple of ‘repudiating’ order on phone access

The phone is owned by Farook’s former employer, the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health. On Friday, writing on Business Insider, McAfee announced that he would hack into an iPhone for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. And how could they?

“What took them so long? Things that could keep them from working with the government”, he said.

The fight between the feds and Apple has been turned up a notch.

“I have friends”, he said. “Give me a break”, he sneered. “If you accept my offer, then you will not need to ask Apple to place a back door in its product, which will be the beginning of the end of America”.

James Ramsay, a professor of security studies and director of the homeland security program at the University of New Hampshire, said the Apple case “presents a very concrete example of the tension between the needs of a digital economy for security and the needs of the law enforcement community to promulgate a security investigation with known bad guys”. Dianne Feinstein of California, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, also called on Apple CEO Tim Cook to reverse course. “They have asked us to build a backdoor to the iPhone”, Cook wrote. The social media giant reinforced that it does comply with lawful requests from authorities, but “will continue to fight aggressively against requirements for companies to weaken the security of their systems”.

The term “backdoor”, describing a behind-the-scenes method that hackers use to gain unauthorized access, has for years colored the discussion of how the government can obtain protected information or eavesdrop on encrypted communications from criminals or terrorists. “Customer data is under siege from a variety of different directions”, he said. However, a 2015 court case in NY revealed that Apple had unlocked phones for government authorities over 70 times previously – including OS versions incorporating zero-knowledge encryption, leading to questions of whether their current stance is a matter of principled user privacy, or an opportunity for positive public relations.

It’s a toss-up. Tech companies, technologists and liberal politicians are firmly on Apple’s side; conservative politicians and law enforcement professionals who have seen horrific cybercrimes have taken the opposite view.

GOP presidential contender Donald Trump is urging his followers to boycott Apple until it complies with the USA government in its ongoing encryption battle. It’s not even his phone, so we don’t even have to go that far.

But there could also be blowback against Apple for refusing to cooperate with the government in a terrorism case, he said.

Jan Dawson, chief analyst with Jackdaw Research, says statements of public support from major tech companies have been guarded and “somewhat lukewarm” with Google and Facebook voicing public support for Apple more forcefully and swiftly than Microsoft, Yahoo and Twitter.

What are the implications for me of a ruling against Apple?

“We’re going to bring our jobs back to this country”. “Compromising the security of our personal information can ultimately put our personal safety at risk”, he wrote.

As the maker of trend-setting gadgets like the iPhone and iPad, Apple has changed the way people use technology in their daily lives. “But now the USA government has asked us for something we simply do not have, and something we consider too risky to create”.

“In the wrong hands, this software – which does not exist today – would have the potential to unlock any iPhone in someone’s physical possession”. “And while the government may argue that its use would be limited to this case, there is no way to guarantee such control”.

U.S. officials have declined to speculate how the courts may enforce the order, but Apple in theory could be held in contempt, with a number of penalties, if it fails to comply.