Apple vs the DOJ

Although it would certainly be helpful to law enforcement to access private encrypted information on suspected terrorists cell phones, trying to get the San Bernardino shooter's phone open seems like the wrong place to start.

Since there is no pending prosecution (both these terrorists are dead), the information is of no use to the judicial process. And if it contains only information about the shooting and the shooters' process of radicalization, it will likely only confirm what is already known.

It may, however, contain information on contacts with other groups and people involved in planning terrorism; indeed if a court has said this is a lawful search one assumes evidence to this effect much have been shown to the court.  

The issue here is not whether the FBI can look at information, but whether Apple can be compelled to help them do so; Tim Cook for Apple has refused.

There are probably a number of reasons for this; the obvious one is that he does not want to make his customers feel less secure.  But there are others. For example, if any ruling is fairly narrow (for example limited to Apple), that gives Android and thus Google a competitive advantage, at least temporarily. So Cook must balance his duty to Apple shareholders with his duty to the Government.

To do what the FBI is asking appears to require a patch to the operating system that would be applied to the phone allowing it to be unlocked. But that patch, once created, is "out there" and will likely 1) be requested again so would either have to be recreated each time a request is made or 2) have to be kept under lock and key thus affording hackers the opportunity to steal it and render all iPhones vulnerable.

And it's not just local hackers we have to worry about. Some maybe working for unfriendly governments (think of China's hacking of US corporations). Yahoo's rather sorry history here (it was forced to provide the name of one of its email users to the Chinese government who then jailed him for sedition on the basis of one email he had sent to a friend at the New York Times). Then there are those who would pay hackers for the patch to sift though any personal information iPhone users keep on their devices, credit card information, for example. Or your home address and social security number. The potential for mischief once the patch is out there is enormous.

That's the dilemma Tim Cook is wrestling with. Not an easy one; but easier than had the FBI claimed with certainty that the phone contained information needed to foil an imminent terror plot.