Cybersecurity and civilian data become a hot topic at the end of last night’s GOP debate with Apple getting caught in the crossfire. Candidates criticized the company for its decision to keep customer data private, but Apple fanboy Jeb Bush revealed he has a radical strategy that will get Tim Cook to change his stance on encryption: ask really nicely.
Fox Business moderator Neil Cavuto asked Bush how he would deal with Tim Cook’s strong opposition to leaving a back door in encryption. Bush responded that he would make a breakthrough by having lots of meetings with Silicon Valley execs and pestering them like a five year old.
“What if Tim Cook is telling you ‘no, Mr President’?” asked Cavuto.
“You got to keep asking,” replied Jeb. “You got to keep asking because this is a hugely important issue.”
See, if we just had a lot more meetings everything would be solved and Apple would finally decide that the government can be trusted with unlimited access to all of your private data, because Jeb’s great at meetings.
“There needs to be more than one meeting, there needs to be compete dialogue with the large companies,” continued Jeb. “They understand there is a national security risk. We ought to give them a little bit of liability release so that they share data amongst themselves and share data with the federal government.”
Bush’s proposal of more friendly meetings drew a lot of criticism and laughs among the tech crowd on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/__gcd/status/687851695133466624
Jeb's strategy with Tim Cook is like my daughter's plan when she doesn't want to go to bed. Please. PLease. PLEase. PLEAse. PLEASe. PLEASE!!
— Dan Primack (@danprimack) January 15, 2016
Maybe Jeb doesn’t realize that lots of meetings between Silicon Valley execs and the White House have been going on for years. Obama has heavily courted Americas top tech companies with frequent meetings to the Bay Area. Top White House officials just hosted a meeting in Silicon Valley last week where Tim Cook blasted the Obama Administration for not protecting citizens’ rights to keep their personal files private.
Via: FastCo
