The U.S. Department of Justice briefly gained the upper hand over Apple this week when it made it clear that it was in no rush to reveal how it hacked the iPhone at the center of the San Bernardino shooting case — thereby stopping Apple from plugging that particular vulnerability.
However, it seems that Apple’s back in the driving seat after a new report reveals that the Justice Department may be compelled to reveal its hacking methods if it wants to continue with a case asking a New York court to force Apple to unlock a different iPhone handset.
The DOJ has two weeks to decide whether it wants to continue with the case, which revolves around the iPhone used in a Brooklyn drug case. Despite having supposedly hacked the iPhone in the San Bernardino case, it is not yet clear whether whatever method was used there can be used on this second iPhone.
In a statement, Apple has said that it doesn’t know the FBI’s solution to iPhone security, who developed it, or “what it allegedly achieves.”
Apple is already ahead in the New York case. Last month, an NY magistrate judge ruled that the government isn’t allowed to compel Apple to unlock an iPhone involved in a criminal investigation using the All Writs Act.
Not only does the government have to overturn that particular privacy win for Apple; it also risks having to divulge whatever technical hacking effort it reportedly achieved.
Choices, choices…
Source: Reuters
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
5 responses to “Justice Department may be forced to disclose iPhone hacking secrets”
Not really. If the Feds have a working method in place, they won’t need Apple anymore. They may drop that case too.
Not necessarily. The method they allegedly used supposedly works only on the iPhone 5c. If it wants Apple to unlock another iPhone that doesn’t fit the bill, it may have to share how it hacked the San Bernardino iPhone.
IF those Feds had not been lying about cracking San Bernardino iPhone.
The FBI has declared that the little people, that is the public that pays their salaries in the former republic of the USA, will not be told.
FBI tried to save face, Apple was smart to put that clause in. Now FBI can’t simply cherry pick their fights. I’m ashamed to be a tax payer that funds an organization that wants to stifle American exceptionalism and one of the greatest capitalist enterprises on the planet.