Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter To Back Apple With Legal Filing In FBI Case (recode.net) 129
An anonymous reader writes: Google plans to follow Microsoft in throwing its legal support behind Apple in its increasingly contentious dispute with the federal government around the iPhone connected with the San Bernardino terror attacks, according to sources.
At a congressional hearing on Thursday, Microsoft's legal chief, Brad Smith, said that the company plans to file an amicus brief next week in support of Apple's resistance to helping the FBI hack the phone. Google will deliver its own supporting brief 'soon,' according to sources familiar with the company.
At a congressional hearing on Thursday, Microsoft's legal chief, Brad Smith, said that the company plans to file an amicus brief next week in support of Apple's resistance to helping the FBI hack the phone. Google will deliver its own supporting brief 'soon,' according to sources familiar with the company.
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It takes a real idiot to shit on people for doing the right thing.
Stop being fooled !! It's just a Dog and Pony Show (Score:2, Interesting)
Call me anything you want, I ain't gonna buy this 'corporations standing up for the common people' crap
I've been in this field since the 1970's and the way I look at it is more like the following ---
Big Bad Corporations, being part and parcel of the big brother, already have backdoors built into devices they sell to the public
From time to time big brother will stage dog and pony shows designed to sway public mindset
This time they use the Islamic Terrorist attack on Christmas Party in California as the backd
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Considering most UK and US political leaders did not have any issues with VPN use or more https, thats going to be interesting.
The 5 eye nation's security services seem very happy for people to keep feeling secure using https and VPN's.
Any code thats a standard seems to be of no challenge to the US and UK once its consumer ready. The only magic is in keeping people trusting their US branded technology. Keep talking, texting, having gps on t
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It's a question of understanding who your adversaries are and what your goal is.
For example, the UK is trying to bring in new laws requiring ISPs to spy on customers and keep logs of their activities, to be turned over the local government, Trading Standards, the police and various other bodies on demand. A VPN is highly effective at frustrating this kind of spying, because all the ISP can see is a VPN connection. It still leaks some metadata, such as times when the connection is active, but it's vastly bet
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Re: Stop being fooled !! It's just a Dog and Pony (Score:2)
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Awesome...
Re:Not very secure (Score:5, Insightful)
What is being asked to do isn't that complicated - please disable this feature, please reduce this timeout... It shouldn't take 1/2 staff year to produce that firmware (and even if you include full review and validation). It is in Apple's interest to increase this time because this is what they will charge the FBI when they are required to produce the firmware if/when they loose the supreme court hearing. (which by that time, all of the data would be worthless in 2-3 years)
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It isn't quite that easy. There is a question response validation process that the system providing the firmware has to process correctly, using a unique variable in each process, requiring Apple's signing key.
I'm not saying it couldn't be possible some other way, just that there isn't a publicly known one.
Leaked firmware can not be reused ... (Score:4, Interesting)
The court order asks apple to produce the compromised firmware, load it on the phone and then hand the phone to the fbi. From there the fbi will extract the firmware and use it on any other 5c or compatible they want to crack. And it will leak.
It Apple hacks up the passcode code they can also add code to limit the firmware to this one particular phone. Once digitally signed the FBI and black hats could no more make this work on a different phone than they could have hacked up the passcode code themselves. Apple's digital signature prevents any tampering at all. There need not be any threat to any other 5c.
The real problem is that if one judge in one case can compel Apple to provide such technical assistance then any judge in any case can also do so. The government's claim this is a one-time thing is bogus.
Morally it must be done by Apple ... (Score:2)
Since Apple does not want to do the work for the government... how about the court order Apple turn over all source code to the Government and then the government recompile the firmware?
No. The FBI would not limit this modified version of the code to a single device. **If** this modified version is to be created it is Apple's duty to its customers to do so to ensure that his modification runs only on a single phone.
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Since Apple does not want to do the work for the government... how about the court order Apple turn over all source code to the Government and then the government recompile the firmware?
No. The FBI would not limit this modified version of the code to a single device. **If** this modified version is to be created it is Apple's duty to its customers to do so to ensure that his modification runs only on a single phone.
Please stop saying single phone. It's no less of a false statement coming from you than from the government.
This is about precedent, and as others have pointed out very clearly, if one judge can compel Apple to do this, any judge can.
Therefore, you'll just have thousands of requests to create a modification that "runs only on a single phone", and the legal requests pouring out of attorney offices will be as cut-and-paste as "this" was.
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Yet the simple fact remains. If Apple makes the change then a single instance of the new code is limited to a particular device. If the FBI makes the change then a single instance of the new code can be used on any compatible device. In the Apple scenario a new instance can be created only upon a court order ordering tec
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Perhaps you missed it but I have repeatedly said that the real problem is that if one judge in one case can order Apple's technical assistance then any judge in any case can order it too. Yet the simple fact remains. If Apple makes the change then a single instance of the new code is limited to a particular device. If the FBI makes the change then a single instance of the new code can be used on any compatible device. In the Apple scenario a new instance can be created only upon a court order ordering technical assistance from Apple. In the FBI scenario its merely a matter of FBI discretion. An instance of the new code can be limited to a device, preventing widespread problems if leaked by law enforcement.
Once ANYONE develops a solution and it's used in a single case, legal precedent will ensure it is whored out to every legal office in the country, making the moral aspects or "limitations" of this "one" solution completely pointless, as well as any argument from DOJ about it being limited-use. They're full of shit with that claim, and we both know this. I don't have any warm and fuzzy feelings about Apple being the moral coder here. There's none to be had, and for good reason.
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Perhaps you missed it but I have repeatedly said that the real problem is that if one judge in one case can order Apple's technical assistance then any judge in any case can order it too. Yet the simple fact remains. If Apple makes the change then a single instance of the new code is limited to a particular device. If the FBI makes the change then a single instance of the new code can be used on any compatible device. In the Apple scenario a new instance can be created only upon a court order ordering technical assistance from Apple. In the FBI scenario its merely a matter of FBI discretion. An instance of the new code can be limited to a device, preventing widespread problems if leaked by law enforcement.
Once ANYONE develops a solution and it's used in a single case, legal precedent will ensure it is whored out to every legal office in the country, making the moral aspects or "limitations" of this "one" solution completely pointless, as well as any argument from DOJ about it being limited-use. They're full of shit with that claim, and we both know this. I don't have any warm and fuzzy feelings about Apple being the moral coder here. There's none to be had, and for good reason.
The fact remains that Apple requiring a court order for every device specific instance is a better situation than allowing any law enforcement agency to just load the new code on any phone at its own discretion. With Apple's involvement there is no universal back door, without Apple's involvement there is. Preventing the later is Apple's moral obligation.
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It's worth reading what Apple's lawyers wrote, it;'s quite insightful.
They would need to put a lot of effort into development. A bug could wipe or otherwise damage the phone, so it needs to be carefully tested. They would have to interface with the FBI's cracking software, or write it for them.
Once it exists, other law enforcement agencies will want to use it. Apple has a choice: keep the source code around, in which case it is at risk of being stolen by various hackers and state agencies, or delete it and
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Apple has a choice: keep the source code around, in which case it is at risk of being stolen by various hackers and state agencies, or delete it and start from scratch for the next request.
Well, we haven't seem Apples master signing keys leaked yet, so just store the source code with them, with a similar process chain to access it. They already store something which would be devastating to iPhone security if released, so that's not really all that much of a good argument imho.
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And you still have the problem of other law enforcement agencies wanting their own "just for a single phone" releases. The FBI has already admitted to having hundreds of requests lined up and ready for when this precedent is set. Other police departments have their own lists. Other countries doubtlessly are waiting to see if Apple caves. If you think that this will end with this one phone then you are hopelessly naive. If Apple complies with "this one phone", they'll be flooded with requests for additi
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No, I don't think this will end with a single phone being unlocked, and I damn well don't give a damn that it won't - if Apple complies with this request, then there is a legal basis for other requests as well. That's how the legal system works.
And no, I don't have a problem with that - if there is a warrant or a court agreement, then I don't see why a phone shouldn't be unlocked on demand. In the US or in other countries.
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It's worth reading what Apple's lawyers wrote, it;'s quite insightful.
Frankly like most stuff written by lawyers when they are trying to influence perception its a bit of "exaggeration".
They would need to put a lot of effort into development.
Two weeks they say, fine, bill the FBI for the time.
A bug could wipe or otherwise damage the phone, so it needs to be carefully tested.
That's already part of the two week estimate. And frankly such bugs are the FBI's problem not Apples. The FBI needs to do testing and sign off on it, the FBI has the technical expertise to do so.
They would have to interface with the FBI's cracking software, or write it for them.
Again, already part of Apple's two week estimate. And writing it for the FBI is actually Apple's moral obligation to Apple customers **if** this soft
Re: Leaked firmware can not be reused ... (Score:3)
The real problem is that if the FBI establish this precedent, next it will be the Chinese Government demanding the same for the phone of a US Embassy employee they suspect of being a CIA agent (upon pain of Apple being disallowed from further business in China).
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The real problem is that if the FBI establish this precedent, next it will be the Chinese Government demanding the same for the phone of a US Embassy employee they suspect of being a CIA agent (upon pain of Apple being disallowed from further business in China).
Actually Apple has some leverage. China wants iPhones, iPads, Macs, etc to be made in China.
Also Apple could get a US court to order them not to comply, making it a gov't v gov't problem.
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It's true that the firmware would be limited to a specific device, and the precedent is far more dangerous than the code itself. However no system is perfect. There is at least some chance that some exploit could be derived from the custom firmware that helps break the security of other devices. A (not perfect) analogy would be giving out the combination to your home safe because, since your doors are locked, you assume no one will get a chance to access the safe.
I doubt there is any shortage of people working for the FBI, or any shortage of black hats, that could develop exploits by disassembling the current passcode code and studying it. I think these folks would probably come up with changes similar to Apple's on their own. Apple does not have more technical skill in this regard, the source code a convenience. All Apple really has is the digital signature that the hardware is expecting to see on the code. And of course the ability to move functionality from softw
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Apple explicitly and on the record before the court has submitted that you cannot simply "just disable" some features to get this operating system request to work. In Apple's latest motion before the court, filed today Feb 26:
You can not find the truth in a legal document ... (Score:1)
six to ten Apple engineers and employees dedicating a very substantial portion of their time for a minimum of two weeks, and likely as many as four weeks.
Given that that is a legal document for court it is likely to be full of exaggeration and misdirection in order to frame things in a manner that Apple wants. An actual engineering document would say something quite different.
For example there is no need to input the passcode electronically, through the lighting connector presumably. Assuming 5 second per try you only need 14 FBI intern hours to try all 10,000 possible passcodes.
As for the two weeks of that team's effort. Highly, highly, padded. Certai
Re:You can not find the truth in a legal document (Score:5, Informative)
Have you read what the court order to apple says? Actually says? I have read the actual court order.
It says:
1) It will bypass or disable the auto-erase function.
2) it will enable the FBI to submit passcodes to the subject device for testing electronically via the physical device port, bluetooth, wifi, or other protocol available.
3) it will not purposefully introduce any additional delay between passcodes attempts beyond what is incurred by hardware
4) they are to provide a signed iPhone software file that can be loaded onto the device and run from RAM without modifying the iOS installation on the actual phone, the user data, or system partitions on the device's flash memory
Source: http://www.ndaa.org/pdf/SB-Sho... [ndaa.org]
So yes...they are required to allow for electronic entry of the passcode. And they have to write the software in a way that hasn't been done before... without touching the flash memory on the iPhone. You can not run iOS on the phone "from RAM".
This is absolutely a new piece of software that they will likely have to start with. Much more complicated than just "removing a few lines of code".
Apple Brief here (Score:1)
The apple brief is available here: https://cryptome.org/2016/02/u... [cryptome.org]
Ted Olson (solicitor general to the United States under Bush) is on-brief.
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My guess is, you strap 'ol Tim to a waterboard and you'll get it much faster.
Regardless of the outcome of the waterboarding session, it would sound the death knell for US capitalism.
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Says who? There are a number of assumptions in the FBI's argument:
1) It's possible to break 256-bit encryption
2) The mythical man month
3) There is a flaw that would allow which the FBI/NSA doesn't already have access to
4) It's Apple's responsibility to create and maintain a rather expensive forensic analysis tool for the state
5) It will only be used once and once it exists they won't be forced to repeat or release the tool
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The importance of these tech giants backing Apple's play is enormous. Sure, there may be some international sales advantages to standing up to The Gov'T, but, that doesn't suddenly mean it can't be simultaneously good for internet/personal freedom.
Maybe, this just isn't toooo good to be true.
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This will just make domestic collect it all legal in open domestic courts. No more parallel construction, raw signals intelligence from any phone is US court ready.
Re "It will only be used once and once it exists they won't be forced to repeat or release the tool"
Apple reveals other FBI demands for iPhone unlocking around U.S. (02/23/2016 )
http://www.mercurynews.com/cri... [mercurynews.com]
This will be interesting (Score:3)
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Who's really got the power corporations or government.
Anyone can hold mere power. This may be a bit larger than that.
What will be defined here is Control.
Those who fought and died to establish our country over 200 years ago didn't make any mistakes when starting our founding document with We the People.
And if we relinquish that, then Ben Franklin was right. We deserve neither.
Take special note to the age of the People noted here, for that is exactly how fucking long We have been concerned about who truly retains Control.
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And, it is important to note, that what Apple is saying is that they don't have control in this case. It's not like they have some super-key that would unlock the phone and they are refusing to give it. They have no access to the phone. The government is requiring Apple to assert control over the phone while simultaneously try to assert their control over Apple. If the government wins, it will be Government > Apple > Users. If Apple wins, it will be Users > [Apple | Government]. There will st
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Heh (Score:1)
Microsoft may be behind Apple, but Bill Gates isn't.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/3559... [ft.com]
Can't say I'm a fan of his rationale, he of all people should know better.
Re: Heh (Score:2, Informative)
You should probably look up Bill Gates' follow up to that article you linked, in which he says that Financial Times mis-quoted and misled readers by taking his statements out of context.
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Do you have a link handy? I wasn't aware of that.
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http://www.abc.net.au/news/201... [abc.net.au]
Saying it can be done is not saying it should be (Score:2)
Frankly, his quotes are him backing the FBI. He disputes Apple, says that they can unlock just THIS phone. He's absolutely siding with the FBI on this.
There is a difference between saying that the FBI is technically correct that Apple could provide updated signed software/firmware to get past the passcode on this one specific phone, and saying that the FBI should have Apple do this. The former is likely a technical fact. On the 5C the passcode delay is likely implemented in patchable software/firmware, as is enabling the wipe on too many passcode failures. Apple could add code to the software/firmware delivered to the FBI to lock this update to this one p
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Gates claimed his quotes were taken out of context.
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Well, the only things BG had to contribute was a lot of luck and some sales talent. He never had any real engineering skills or any real understanding of what was going on. (No idea why people think different. You can be a primitive cave-man and get rich in the US. Just look at Trump.) No wonder BG is no longer relevant.
Incidentally, his retraction (done since then) reads like somebody with a clue explained to him what is actually going on.
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They could, but that's not what the FBI is asking for. They're asking for a tool that could open any door, without the landlord's help, not this one specific door.
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They could, but that's not what the FBI is asking for. They're asking for a tool that could open any door, without the landlord's help, not this one specific door.
Apple could limit the updated code to this one particular phone. Such an addition by Apple would be just as untamperable as the passcode entry code today. Untamperable due to Apple's digital signature. So no, it is quite easy for Apple to limit their tool to one and only one door.
The real problem is that if one court on one case can order such technical assistance from Apple then any court on any case can do so as well. The government's claim that this is a one time thing is bogus. I don't see how they c
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Think of every home having a fire department key box on a wall by default.
One standard master key is then given the US federal gov, the staff at the Australia, New Zealand, UK and Canadian embassies under 5 eye terms.
Later contractors in the US, EU and other nations get a copy too as they are friends with the US gov. Ex staff and former staff get to keep a key too.
Soon the master keys are for sale.
Anyone can then just
Well, well, well (Score:2)
Having wetted and raised their fingers, guess who has now determined which way the wind of public opinion is blowing.
I suspect the direction of the wind is related to the realization that within a year, President Trump/Clinton may be relishing all the available phone access.
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Apparently only 38% agree with Apple. Most people seem to side with the FBI on this issue.
http://news.yahoo.com/more-half-americans-think-apple-182431121.html
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38% in this context is HUGE. Fucking good thing we aren't a democrazy.
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Apparently only 38% agree with Apple. Most people seem to side with the FBI on this issue.
Millions of Americans also think the Earth is around 6,000 years old. It's a good thing we're a (somewhat) representative democracy.
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That 38% is a rather misleading number. You imply that, therefore, 62% are on the side of the FBI. But the very article you cite shows only a 51% commitment to the FBI's argument; leaving plenty of people as yet undecided. And the more clueful the population segment, the more the numbers shift toward Apple, ending at 47% FBI, 43% Apple, 10% undecided. And Apple's barely had a chance to begin to make its case; where the TLAs have been bludgeoning the population with "FEAR THE TERRORISTS!!!" for a decade
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I agree.
I think Apple should comply with the court order. Put their best Chinese software engineers on developing an iPhone crack ASAP.
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Sorry what?
How odd... (Score:2)
All the corps whose services and devices you should never use.
Time to create another terrorist attack (Score:5, Interesting)
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Wouldn't be hard. All they have to do is modify one of their terrorist sting operations, instead of cops leave the promised weapons (and encrypted devices) at the drop-off point.
The Crossroads (Score:2)
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Roll over in this case and find a better case to take the fight over.
See, that's exactly the wrong thing to do because it sets a precedent; then the feds can come back later and say "You did this before, you have no excuse not to do it now", or worse, they'll use the precedent to say "See, they're willing to do it when we ask, so they should just make their products so we can bypass it when we want to without having to ask them to help". From there they'd legislate that all companies provide federal backdoors to encrypted devices; then we're cooked, nothing would ever be pri
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Make no mistake, they are lining up behind Apple on this because if they don't the FBI will come after them next. It could just as easily been an Android phone or a Microsoft phone or a Facebook account that the FBI wants to get its mitts on. And once that door is open it will never close again.
The FBI could have chose to negotiate with Apple about this privately but they chose to take it public. Why? As Rahm Emanuel famously once said "never let a crisis go to waste". The government is once again using the excuse of "terrorism" to take away individual freedoms and rights. This is not just about getting into one iPhone. This is about getting into ALL phones. It always starts like this and little by little our freedoms erode.
Even if the FBI gets past the lock screen all of the data on the phone is encrypted separately. It will be useless to them, assuming there is anything useful on there in the first place. We don't know that. The FBI doesn't know that. Nobody knows that. For all we know there is nothing but Angry Birds on that phone.
But let's just suppose that we give the FBI the benefit of the doubt and let them crack the phone. How is that going to make us any safer against terrorists? It's the same deal with the NSA. Heck, the TSA for that matter. Gigantic waste of fucking time. Maybe if these idiots would spend less time bickering with the CIA I might cut them some slack. But they can't because they are Federal drones, programmed to engage in political infighting, waste, fraud, and general dick-headery.
I used to do consulting work for the Feds. Every place I went was more or less the same. The managers were almost uniformly stone cold morons. Whose bosses were politicians that wouldn't know efficient business practice if it kicked them square in the nuts. I went in hoping to change things for the better. I left vowing never to return no matter how much they offered to pay me. It was a shock something akin to someone that gets their first hospital bill. You know it's going to be bad but you have no idea until you experience it for yourself.
That's noble.. (Score:1)
One argument: "How bad is the threat - REALLY?" (Score:2)
Since 9/11, American deaths by terror have averaged about 12 per year [umd.edu] worldwide. That puts terrorism right up there with lightning strikes [noaa.gov].
Even if there were a 9/11 class attack in the US every year, it wouldn't hold a candle to drunk driving deaths. -- but drunk driving deaths don't make the news because they're so common. It's the fallacy of the news cycle -- to be national news it has to be rare. Mor
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I'm not sure that she's not a bigger threat than these terrorists.
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People also tend to forget that Apple does legally avoid taxes where possible, but they are the #1 or #2 tax payer in the US. No other organization or person pays more or much more since over the past few years occasionally XOM goes a bit higher.
However , they still have to do business in the US so they would be subject to US laws wherever they went and they would still have to pay US taxes on all of their US business...
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