Reply to post: You're missing the point

Cops jam a warrant into Apple to make it cough up Texas mass killer's iPhone, iCloud files

Anonymous Coward
Anonymous Coward

You're missing the point

Last year, such an order was issued for an iPhone owned by one of San Bernardino shooters, prompting Apple to refuse the order on the grounds it would spark days of bad publicity, er, sorry, jeopardize the security of all its handsets and set a terrible precedent. The FBI eventually found a secret means to forcibly unlock the phone.

The crux of the discussion was that Apple has made damn sure it cannot gain access itself by any means, and by so in principle has protected the company itself from such attempts. Services are a different matter: as long as clients do not use their own crypto such as mounting drives via cryptomator, Apple has access to the data and can hand off as demanded.

There are ways to contain that too, but not when the data is in the US, managed by a US company with 100% US ownership - Microsoft has already discovered that the DoJ doesn't really care that a subsidiary is in another country, they still own it and are so deemed having the power to compel (a separate fight, but also worth watching because of the ability to completely screw the foreign business of the whole of Silicon Valley if they don't start using Trump's Mar-a-Lago and Trump Tower pretty quickly).

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon