FBI has finally unlocked the San Bernardino shooter, Syed Rizwan Farook's iPhone to help in investigation
The Government of United States stopped court battle with Apple after the Federal Bureau of Investigation successfully extracted data from San Bernardino shooter, Syed Rizwan Farook’s iPhone.
The development effectively brought a 6-week legal war to its end. A war is poised to shape digital privacy in the coming years. Instead, Washington and Silicon Valley are set to return to a simmering cold battle to find a balance between law enforcement and privacy in the era of applications.
Department of Justice lawyers said in the court on March 28, 2016 that they now didn’t need the smartphone makerto help them around the safety countermeasures on the Farook’s device. The US government had requested the US court to vacate an order given on February 16, 2016 demanding Apple to develop software to crack safety settings of the iPhone to help government investigators.
While addressing the reporters in a conference call organized by the Justice Department, an official of a law enforcement agency refused to provide information regarding the used technique other than to say someone outside the US government provided it. According to the Guardian, the technique used by the authorities has been identified.
The official also refused to tell whether the government would reveal the technique – which probably exploits a safety glitch in the iPhone – with the Cupertino based company. If the technique is disclosed, then it would presumably result in the organization getting rid of the safety flaw. This has left the DOJ with a hard choice: make every iPhone safe from the rest of the governments and hackers who know how iPhones can be cracked, or protect the investigation technique.
On March 28, 2016, the authorities would just confirm the technique works on Farook’s iPhone model – iPhone 5c – but it is possible it could also crack other models of the smartphone running the same software.
The company fought the order given by the court in February 2016 with a huge legal and public relations campaign. Apple claimed that developing such software would compel it to let down its values and betray the privacy and security of every customer.
Apple CEO Tim Cook claimed if the organization is compelled to re-engineer its devices, it would lead to opening Pandora’s Box that could provide the government a lot of control over how technology companies manufacture their products.
The case compelled public leaders from Bill Gates to Barack Obama to share their views regarding the balance between national security and privacy. It also persuaded legislators to craft a law to regulate new messaging services and devices that rely on strong encryption to safeguard user privacy.
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