Apple ordered to create software to help unlock a phone for FBI

[Mike F]

Originally Posted by photon

I don't see it as disingenuous at all, such a tool would be master key. Or a better description would be a bump key. A bump key doesn't unlock locks, it just abuses the lock in such a way to make getting at what's behind the lock trivially easy. They're being asked to invent bump keys.

No different than the people asking for back doors into encryption systems, this is just another kind of back door. It doesn't matter how much someone promises to not abuse the back door, or how hard they try and protect the back door, it's like a chain, it's only as strong as its weakest link.

Unless you define it as trivially easy to reverse engineer it from a key targeted at one specific door to a generalized key, and then to remove the necessity for Apple to digitally sign off on any firmware updates, then no, it's not a bump key.

Again, I'm not passing judgment on whether the tool the FBI wants is good or bad, I'm just advocating for an accurate description when having the discussion. And calling something which would require several very challenging steps before it could give access to more than one specific phone "a master key" is not accurate.

[Resolute 14]

Completely obliterating one of those challenging steps makes the ability to hack all phones vastly simpler. And that is Apple's point. They say up front that the hack the FBI is demanding is only one part of this. But they also acknowledge that, despite best efforts, losing control of their signing cert is a possibility.

Apple is being completely accurate in its presentation. Namely, the fact that the hack the FBI wants simply should not be allowed to exist at all because of the danger it represents.

[Locke]

Which makes sense to a degree too.

If I'm Apple I'd be telling them to pound sand because my business is to make consumer electronic products, why would I, as a business, want to open myself up to these kinds of attacks on my products?

And as a total aside, what the hell can this guy possibly have on his phone that is so damned crucial? Am I using my phone wrong? There is absolutely nothing awesome on my phone.

[Resolute 14]

It's not about the phone. It is a fishing expedition in the hopes of creating a precedent. And the FBI is callously using public sentiment against terrorists and ISIS to try and get both the courts and the public on their side.

Which is why this is the case, out of the hundreds Apple says are out there, that the FBI brought forward.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

It's not about the phone. It is a fishing expedition in the hopes of creating a precedent. And the FBI is callously using public sentiment against terrorists and ISIS to try and get both the courts and the public on their side.

Which is why this is the case, out of the hundreds Apple says are out there, that the FBI brought forward.

Why dont they just waterboard the password out of the guy? They've already set that precedent and it seems like more their style.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Locke

Why dont they just waterboard the password out of the guy? They've already set that precedent and it seems like more their style.

Which guy? Aren't both suspects dead?

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Which guy? Aren't both suspects dead?

Thats never stopped them before!

[Swift]

Why don't they just waterboard Tim Cook?

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Cameron Swift

Why don't they just waterboard Tim Cook?

Well...if he keeps saying no they just might.

[Fuzz]

He should be waterboarded for iTunes match, regardless.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Here is a thought experiment.

Let's suppose that there's a way that you can create a perfectly impenetrable room in your house. The technology somehow comes along to allow this: if you pay SecurityCo enough money, they will install a room that literally no one can get into except for you. You can put whatever you like in there, secure in the knowledge that no matter how important the public interest (for example, there is a computer in there set to detonate nuclear bombs across the globe), no one can get in.

Should SecurityCo be allowed to make and sell this product?

[Rathji]

I think the better question is why wouldn't they be allowed to?

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Well, the government is empowered to create legislation regulating products. So, just for example, if you were to invent something whose obvious, sole purpose was to make it harder to catch you if you committed a crime, they might ban the sale of that item on public policy grounds. The first thing that occurs to me is that there are products that are meant to obscure your license plate so that it can't be seen on traffic cameras; those are mostly illegal.

I actually stole the above thought experiment from Sam Harris after listening to his most recent podcast where he muses about this topic for a few minutes (I found myself mostly disagreeing with his conclusions). The other example he gave was if a company were to develop a drug you could take that would make your DNA un-analyzable, such that if you committed a murder or rape and your DNA was found at the scene, it could never be used to identify you. He asked if that drug would be prohibited; I think it likely would but I don't think it's quite analogous - whereas the above "secure room" example is, I think, a very good analogy to what we're talking about with the iPhone.

It's a public policy decision, and legislators have to weigh the interest of the public in its own security with their interest in having access to an unlimited pool of technology including everything anyone can dream up and make work.

[Rathji]

Encryption isn't a way for us to commit crimes, it is a way for us to protect ourselves from becoming victims of crimes.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Or it's a way to secure information that would be used to prosecute you for committing a crime, like a terrorist act. It can be used for different things. That should be obvious. The question is whether this is a limit that the government should place on the product, in order to increase public safety.

[Resolute 14]

See, you're trying to play the same appeal to emotion "but terrorists!" card the government is. History has demonstrated that the trillions of dollars the US has spent on anti-terrorism has had very little real impact. So no, I don't support the idea that we should be surrendering our rights to the government to battle some nebulous boogeyman that government says is haunting every closet in our homes. Bluntly, government itself is the greater threat.

So lets take your hypothetical and mimic this situation. Someone who shot up an office party, and is now dead, has an impenetrable room in their house.

Ok, so what?

The crime is done, the perp is dead, there's nothing more to be done. Whatever is in the room isn't a threat, due to the very nature of the room itself. So now you're just going on a fishing expedition for no reason other than to prove you have power and control. That is what this is about from the government's perspective: power and control. Not security.

[ken0042]

From an investigative point of view, I can see the value in finding out if the person was acting on instructions/funding of somebody else. If you could prevent a similar crime from occurring, that would have some value.

I will leave alone the question if that is worth the loss of privacy.

[photon]

To me asking if an exchange of information electronically should be allowed to be encrypted in such a way that there's no back-door to allow authorities to access it when they deem it worthwhile (just assuming that it is worthwhile) is like asking if exchange of information should be allowed privately in my house without a way for the authorities to access it.

If I can't encrypt communication to be private, I shouldn't be able to have a private conversation either. The only difference with online information is it's easier to gather.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

See, you're trying to play the same appeal to emotion "but terrorists!" card the government is. History has demonstrated that the trillions of dollars the US has spent on anti-terrorism has had very little real impact.

Lol what? You have no way of demonstrating any of this and you've completely missed the point - forget terrorism, there is a constant tension between liberty and security. We are obviously willing to give up some liberty for security as a society. The question is how much, and in what circumstances, and the question right now is whether one of the circumstances is this.

In other words, are we okay with giving up a bit of security - i.e. my iPhone is now 99% secure instead of 100% secure - so that law enforcement can fully investigate crimes. Again, not just terrorism; if someone is murdered, and they're found dead in an alley with their iPhone in their jacket pocket, and you know they were sending texts right up until their time of death, do you not want the police to be able to read those? People have taken VIDEO of their attackers on their phones.

I'm not sure I have an easy answer here, but yours doesn't really satisfy in my opinion. I'm pretty sure where I come down is that this would be a reasonable subject for legislative regulation rather than court intervention.

So lets take your hypothetical and mimic this situation. Someone who shot up an office party, and is now dead, has an impenetrable room in their house.

Ok, so what?

The crime is done, the perp is dead, there's nothing more to be done. Whatever is in the room isn't a threat, due to the very nature of the room itself. So now you're just going on a fishing expedition for no reason other than to prove you have power and control.

You can't possibly believe this. As noted, the interest isn't in undoing the crime, it's determining if this person had any help, finding out what happened to prevent it in the future.

Seriously the logic here is just loopy - what necessarily follows from your reasoning, no exaggeration, is that there's no point in investigating crimes at all where the perpetrator dies committing them. I don't think you'll get many takers there.

[Wormius]

It's all great in theory until somebody becomes disgruntled, or wants to make some money and releases the instructions to the Apple decryption tool.