Apple has supported alphanumeric passwords for ages
Since at least when I owned my 3gs back in 2009. If the terrorists were smart enough to trash their PC's hard drive and both their personal phones, I think the fact that an insecure PIN was used on this phone instead of a password and it wasn't destroyed was because the terrorist knew it contained nothing incriminating. It was a work phone, and thus used for work and not contacting ISIS HQ.
The FBI is using this request as a publicity stunt because no one was listening to them whine about how modern encryption gets in their way. They chose to fight this battle because it is gives them the best possible position they could ever hope to take - not a suspected terrorist but a proven terrorist who killed Americans on American soil.
There is no useful intelligence on that phone, and they know it. It is security theater.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
