Apple’s rhetoric is ‘false’ and ‘corrosive’ in San Bernardino iPhone case, DOJ says

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) is using some of its strongest verbiage yet in its ongoing encryption battle with Apple.

In a court document filed today, the DOJ disparages Apple’s defenses in the case involving the locked iPhone of San Bernardino terrorist Syed Farook.

“Apple’s rhetoric is not only false, but also corrosive of the very institutions that are best able to safeguard our liberty and our rights,” the department says, pointing to the courts, the Fourth Amendment, precedent, laws and “democratically elected branches of government” as the institutions Apple is corroding.

Apple is refusing to assist the FBI in unlocking the device by building a special software to circumvent the device’s security measures. It believes this would be a backdoor into other iPhones, and would set a precedent that would allow law enforcement to execute similar requests down the line.

The FBI and DOJ argue that the software is for one phone in a specific case and wouldn’t put other devices at risk, nor set a precedent.

In today’s filing, the DOJ says any burden on Apple in unlocking the phone is of its own doing because the
company “deliberately raised technology barriers” so that iPhones couldn’t be accessed through a warrant.

“Apple alone can remove those barriers,” the department says.

Apple has said the government’s request places a burden on it because it would have to dedicate staff and resources to the development of the software. What’s more, it would be creating a tool to break code it built to protect its customers. Such a tool would potentially put hundreds of millions of users at risk, the company argues.

The iPhone 5C used by Farook is owned by San Bernardino County, which the DOJ says has consented to the search of the device. By his employment with the county, Farook, who was killed by law enforcement shortly after the December 2 terrorist attack he carried out with his wife, also consented to the search.

Therefore, the court order to compel Apple to unlock the phone “invades no one’s privacy and raises no Fourth Amendment concerns,” which relates to unlawful search and seizure.

Source: techradar.com

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