This is why I will not own any Apple products!

[Pawpaw]

As a result, US-based encryption will always have a shadow of distrust, and I wonder how long it will take bad guys to apply a little meta-encryption.

To this day I am not sure what happened to TrueCrypt, but the above statement is true. If Apple loses, the entire US crypto industry cannot be trusted.

And we used to be the very best at it...back when. How ironic that the government of a "free-market" constitutional republic is willing to kill off that which we used to be good at in order to exert more power and further subvert the constitution upon which it is founded.

To me, it reinforces the idea that it is the nature of government.....ANY kind of gov't....to always try to grow its control over the governed. It is an insatiable beast, and Leviathan is the perfect name for it.

"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts, absolutely." This applies to groups of people (government) just as much as an individual.

[Soccerdad1995]

http://www.macworld.com/article/3034355 ... ation.html

Nice! MacWorld. Was there nothing in the New York Times?

I would guess that the Macworld authors would know a bit more about encryption and Apple products than the writers at the NYT.

But they clearly do not know more than the folks on this forum who are making definitive statements about the ability to break into this phone.

[The Annoyed Man]

This is the Clinton Era "Clipper Chip" all over again.

Someone just sent me a link to the details of that story: https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=231146

The intent was, of course, that if and when the time came that the government had a "lawful" reason to intercept data it could use said escrowed key to get into whatever they wanted to.

But there were several problems. First was arguably the most-serious, which was that the chip's design was done under NSA auspice and considered a state secret. That's right -- it was actually classified at the SECRET level, which of course allegedly forbade anyone not holding said clearance from having any knowledge of how it worked. That was a fanciful load of crap then and it remains one now; Hillary has proved this hundreds of times with her little email server that had resident on it, unencrypted, SECRET (and above) emails.

Never mind that our government can't even manage to keep OPM records secure; there are a lot of people (like virtually everyone) that holds a clearance that has had their personal data, including fingerprints, stolen by the Chinese and, probably the Russians. Like an encryption key that is hard-wired into a chip once a fingerprint is stolen you can't change it and as such the compromise is permanent.

Then, a bit later, it was discovered that the NSA design was incompetent besides and the chip could be tricked. At that point the entire scheme collapsed around the government's ears.

Ironically, between this story and the fact that the San Berdoo terrorist's phone was in FBI possession when the employer reset the password, thereby essentially locking up the data on it, the ONE thing we have going for us in protecting our privacy is the massive incompetence and inefficiency of Leviathan. Such fecklessness can never be entrusted with protecting the private data of private citizens from intrusion by rogue gov't, or hackers. Heck, they can't even protect their employees' data. I'll be hanged if I want to trust them with protecting mine.

[Jusme]

[Bitter Clinger]

This is the Clinton Era "Clipper Chip" all over again.

Someone just sent me a link to the details of that story: https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=231146

The intent was, of course, that if and when the time came that the government had a "lawful" reason to intercept data it could use said escrowed key to get into whatever they wanted to.

But there were several problems. First was arguably the most-serious, which was that the chip's design was done under NSA auspice and considered a state secret. That's right -- it was actually classified at the SECRET level, which of course allegedly forbade anyone not holding said clearance from having any knowledge of how it worked. That was a fanciful load of crap then and it remains one now; Hillary has proved this hundreds of times with her little email server that had resident on it, unencrypted, SECRET (and above) emails.

Never mind that our government can't even manage to keep OPM records secure; there are a lot of people (like virtually everyone) that holds a clearance that has had their personal data, including fingerprints, stolen by the Chinese and, probably the Russians. Like an encryption key that is hard-wired into a chip once a fingerprint is stolen you can't change it and as such the compromise is permanent.

Then, a bit later, it was discovered that the NSA design was incompetent besides and the chip could be tricked. At that point the entire scheme collapsed around the government's ears.

Ironically, between this story and the fact that the San Berdoo terrorist's phone was in FBI possession when the employer reset the password, thereby essentially locking up the data on it, the ONE thing we have going for us in protecting our privacy is the massive incompetence and inefficiency of Leviathan. Such fecklessness can never be entrusted with protecting the private data of private citizens from intrusion by rogue gov't, or hackers. Heck, they can't even protect their employees' data. I'll be hanged if I want to trust them with protecting mine.

Yeah, yeah. All this rage against the government. Well I too believe that the government has gotten way too large and there are far too many unelected bureaucrats who deserve to be shown the door and find honest employment. And no, I do not trust Obama, not after all he has done to destroy the US and its fundamental values that we used to know and love and respect.

But hey, wait just a dang minute all of you! Apple is not on your side! You lust after your Apple products, but do you think Apple cares about your security? Do you think Google and Facebook have your privacy interests at heart? Apple can provide this hack, deliver the data and do so without jeopardizing privacy - buts its far more profitable to play it up in the news as if they had your best interests at heart. And stop quoting Ben Franklin, this is about privacy, not liberty.

Fact is, Apple is protecting Apple and Apple alone, and their profit motive. Sure, they are entitled to make as much profit as they can, but ethically! The problem is that in the blind pursuit of profit at the expense of morality they are possibly endangering more innocent lives. Where is your compassion for the families of the 14 murdered? Where is your outrage over this atrocity and the demand that we do whatever necessary to gain any and all intel that could prevent the next attack? Feeling smug because we chose to live in Texas where a brave Garland traffic officer took out two wanna be jihadi's with his service Glock? Well what if the next attack, for example, something akin to the Boston bombing could be stopped by the data on the phone? Pure speculation? Sure. But your speculation that the government is preparing some nefarious scheme to tap into your private conversations - as if they were all that interesting to begin with, NOT - is just as far beyond the pale.

The families of the innocents slaughtered want this data to be turned over to the FBI in the outside chance that it might save someone else's life. NOT an unreasonable request. So let's have some balance here and a little less slavish Apple worship and wholesale FBI bashing. We are supposed to be law abiding citizens of good standing! Its not all about you.

[justa2e2]

This is the Clinton Era "Clipper Chip" all over again.

Someone just sent me a link to the details of that story: https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=231146

The intent was, of course, that if and when the time came that the government had a "lawful" reason to intercept data it could use said escrowed key to get into whatever they wanted to.

But there were several problems. First was arguably the most-serious, which was that the chip's design was done under NSA auspice and considered a state secret. That's right -- it was actually classified at the SECRET level, which of course allegedly forbade anyone not holding said clearance from having any knowledge of how it worked. That was a fanciful load of crap then and it remains one now; Hillary has proved this hundreds of times with her little email server that had resident on it, unencrypted, SECRET (and above) emails.

Never mind that our government can't even manage to keep OPM records secure; there are a lot of people (like virtually everyone) that holds a clearance that has had their personal data, including fingerprints, stolen by the Chinese and, probably the Russians. Like an encryption key that is hard-wired into a chip once a fingerprint is stolen you can't change it and as such the compromise is permanent.

Then, a bit later, it was discovered that the NSA design was incompetent besides and the chip could be tricked. At that point the entire scheme collapsed around the government's ears.

Ironically, between this story and the fact that the San Berdoo terrorist's phone was in FBI possession when the employer reset the password, thereby essentially locking up the data on it, the ONE thing we have going for us in protecting our privacy is the massive incompetence and inefficiency of Leviathan. Such fecklessness can never be entrusted with protecting the private data of private citizens from intrusion by rogue gov't, or hackers. Heck, they can't even protect their employees' data. I'll be hanged if I want to trust them with protecting mine.

Yeah, yeah. All this rage against the government. Well I too believe that the government has gotten way too large and there are far too many unelected bureaucrats who deserve to be shown the door and find honest employment. And no, I do not trust Obama, not after all he has done to destroy the US and its fundamental values that we used to know and love and respect.

But hey, wait just a dang minute all of you! Apple is not on your side! You lust after your Apple products, but do you think Apple cares about your security? Do you think Google and Facebook have your privacy interests at heart? Apple can provide this hack, deliver the data and do so without jeopardizing privacy - buts its far more profitable to play it up in the news as if they had your best interests at heart. And stop quoting Ben Franklin, this is about privacy, not liberty.

Fact is, Apple is protecting Apple and Apple alone, and their profit motive. Sure, they are entitled to make as much profit as they can, but ethically! The problem is that in the blind pursuit of profit at the expense of morality they are possibly endangering more innocent lives. Where is your compassion for the families of the 14 murdered? Where is your outrage over this atrocity and the demand that we do whatever necessary to gain any and all intel that could prevent the next attack? Feeling smug because we chose to live in Texas where a brave Garland traffic officer took out two wanna be jihadi's with his service Glock? Well what if the next attack, for example, something akin to the Boston bombing could be stopped by the data on the phone? Pure speculation? Sure. But your speculation that the government is preparing some nefarious scheme to tap into your private conversations - as if they were all that interesting to begin with, NOT - is just as far beyond the pale.

The families of the innocents slaughtered want this data to be turned over to the FBI in the outside chance that it might save someone else's life. NOT an unreasonable request. So let's have some balance here and a little less slavish Apple worship and wholesale FBI bashing. We are supposed to be law abiding citizens of good standing! Its not all about you.

How is Apple not protecting the privacy of its users??? The government wants them to create an Operating System that essentially bypasses their security features. Apple does not want to write code to allow the government to brute force the unlock code without resetting the phone. Once that software is created there is literally no going back to before it was created. I for one do not want the government to be able to have unlimited amount of tries when it comes to things like this. I have sympathy for the families but at the same time I have a firm belief that once we go down this rabbit hole there isn't any coming back out. Who's to say that next time it isn't Google or while were at it just make it a law that the government needs a back door into all encryption that will solve the problem of them needing court orders they could do anything they wanted. If you think that the mass surveillance was bad wait until they get their hands on that modified code, and don't be so naive to think that once the device gets loaded with the modified code that the NSA isn't going to copy said code to be able to run it on any phone they wish.

[The Annoyed Man]

If you build it gov't will use it. As far as the families of the victims, I sympathize, but that is the SAME argument that the families of the Sandyhook school shooting victims used to argue that so-called "assault weapons" should be banned.

It's not all Apple by the way. Microsoft and Google are backing Apple's play. No.....it's NOT about me. It's about the Constitution.

[Right2Carry]

This is the Clinton Era "Clipper Chip" all over again.

Someone just sent me a link to the details of that story: https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=231146

The intent was, of course, that if and when the time came that the government had a "lawful" reason to intercept data it could use said escrowed key to get into whatever they wanted to.

But there were several problems. First was arguably the most-serious, which was that the chip's design was done under NSA auspice and considered a state secret. That's right -- it was actually classified at the SECRET level, which of course allegedly forbade anyone not holding said clearance from having any knowledge of how it worked. That was a fanciful load of crap then and it remains one now; Hillary has proved this hundreds of times with her little email server that had resident on it, unencrypted, SECRET (and above) emails.

Never mind that our government can't even manage to keep OPM records secure; there are a lot of people (like virtually everyone) that holds a clearance that has had their personal data, including fingerprints, stolen by the Chinese and, probably the Russians. Like an encryption key that is hard-wired into a chip once a fingerprint is stolen you can't change it and as such the compromise is permanent.

Then, a bit later, it was discovered that the NSA design was incompetent besides and the chip could be tricked. At that point the entire scheme collapsed around the government's ears.

Ironically, between this story and the fact that the San Berdoo terrorist's phone was in FBI possession when the employer reset the password, thereby essentially locking up the data on it, the ONE thing we have going for us in protecting our privacy is the massive incompetence and inefficiency of Leviathan. Such fecklessness can never be entrusted with protecting the private data of private citizens from intrusion by rogue gov't, or hackers. Heck, they can't even protect their employees' data. I'll be hanged if I want to trust them with protecting mine.

Yeah, yeah. All this rage against the government. Well I too believe that the government has gotten way too large and there are far too many unelected bureaucrats who deserve to be shown the door and find honest employment. And no, I do not trust Obama, not after all he has done to destroy the US and its fundamental values that we used to know and love and respect.

But hey, wait just a dang minute all of you! Apple is not on your side! You lust after your Apple products, but do you think Apple cares about your security? Do you think Google and Facebook have your privacy interests at heart? Apple can provide this hack, deliver the data and do so without jeopardizing privacy - buts its far more profitable to play it up in the news as if they had your best interests at heart. And stop quoting Ben Franklin, this is about privacy, not liberty.

Fact is, Apple is protecting Apple and Apple alone, and their profit motive. Sure, they are entitled to make as much profit as they can, but ethically! The problem is that in the blind pursuit of profit at the expense of morality they are possibly endangering more innocent lives. Where is your compassion for the families of the 14 murdered? Where is your outrage over this atrocity and the demand that we do whatever necessary to gain any and all intel that could prevent the next attack? Feeling smug because we chose to live in Texas where a brave Garland traffic officer took out two wanna be jihadi's with his service Glock? Well what if the next attack, for example, something akin to the Boston bombing could be stopped by the data on the phone? Pure speculation? Sure. But your speculation that the government is preparing some nefarious scheme to tap into your private conversations - as if they were all that interesting to begin with, NOT - is just as far beyond the pale.

The families of the innocents slaughtered want this data to be turned over to the FBI in the outside chance that it might save someone else's life. NOT an unreasonable request. So let's have some balance here and a little less slavish Apple worship and wholesale FBI bashing. We are supposed to be law abiding citizens of good standing! Its not all about you.

All I read was Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah.

[WildBill]

It with be interesting to see what happens when the deadline is reached, i.e. if Apple is held in contempt and then what will happen.

[John Galt]

Ben Franklin: "Those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither."

[Solaris]

It with be interesting to see what happens when the deadline is reached, i.e. if Apple is held in contempt and then what will happen.

I will be shocked if the current court has the final say. I expect this to be an ongoing issue till finally resolved perhaps by SCOTUS. This case is very much unlike any previous cases I know of.

[Bitter Clinger]

If you build it gov't will use it. As far as the families of the victims, I sympathize, but that is the SAME argument that the families of the Sandyhook school shooting victims used to argue that so-called "assault weapons" should be banned.

It's not all Apple by the way. Microsoft and Google are backing Apple's play. No.....it's NOT about me. It's about the Constitution.

You are smarter than that. It is not the same argument as that used by gun grabbers - there is no 2nd Amendment for the right to bear phones. Don't wrap this in the Constitution, call it what it is, a legitimate difference in opinion. And pray if it goes your way no one else is murdered. Phones don't kill, terrorists whose opsec is protected by naivety kills.

[Bitter Clinger]

Right2Carry: All I read was Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah.

Impressive argument. I concede to your superior logic.

[parabelum]

Apple is playing dumb, and Feds are playing benevolent.
For Apple, this isn't about privacy as many of their customers phones have been hacked by outside rats. Mine was one of them.

For Feds, this is about control and dominance in the big data spectrum.

Both parties are playing us for stupid.

Apple or Feds could hire a hacker, and with the use of botnet network generating up to 9 password guesses per second, they could have that phone cracked in under 20 minutes.

Again, they play the people for fools.

Notice also how that clerk in Kentucky got jailed for refusing judges order, yet Cook proudly rejects this judges order and nothing happens.

[WildBill]

Apple is playing dumb, and Feds are playing benevolent.
For Apple, this isn't about privacy as many of their customers phones have been hacked by outside rats. Mine was one of them.

For Feds, this is about control and dominance in the big data spectrum.

Both parties are playing us for stupid.

Apple or Feds could hire a hacker, and with the use of botnet network generating up to 9 password guesses per second, they could have that phone cracked in under 20 minutes.

Again, they play the people for fools.

Notice also how that clerk in Kentucky got jailed for refusing judges order, yet Cook proudly rejects this judges order and nothing happens.

I would guess that the FBI has already hacked the phone and it doesn't have any useful information.

So when/if Apple hacks it they won't find any information either. And they can say - see we didn't evade any one's privacy.

I don't think they will try to jail Mr. Cook.