Apple says the FBI never had a case to begin with

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Apple thinks the FBI should never have brought a case against it in the first place.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

The Justice Department may have dropped its suit against Apple after successfully gaining access to the iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters, but according to Apple the case should never have been brought to begin with.

In a statement, Apple doubles-down on its beliefs about the importance of user privacy. Check out the company’s words of wisdom below:

“From the beginning, we objected to the FBI’s demand that Apple build a backdoor into the iPhone because we believed it was wrong and would set a dangerous precedent. As a result of the government’s dismissal, neither of these occurred. This case should never have been brought.

We will continue to help law enforcement with their investigations, as we have done all along, and we will continue to increase the security of our products as the threats and attacks on our data become more frequent and more sophisticated.

Apple believes deeply that people in the United States and around the world deserve data protection, security and privacy. Sacrificing one for the other only puts people and countries at greater risk.

This case raised issues which deserve a national conversation about our civil liberties, and our collective security and privacy. Apple remains committed to participating in that discussion.”

A federal law enforcement official confirmed yesterday that a third-party method of cracking the iPhone security for the San Bernardino handset had proven successful, leading to the DOJ withdrawing its case against Apple.

The FBI enlisted the help of Israeli tech security firm Cellebrite to gain access to the handset, paying a reported $15,000 for the security company to come up with a way around the iPhone’s security, without auto-erasing the contents of the device in the process.

Given that Apple has been so proactive about speaking out concerning user privacy — and the iPhone encryption case was always about so much more than just one device — it will be fascinating to see what the next move is from all parties involved.

Via: John Paczkowski

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