Apple has reignited a privacy battle with the Trump administration by declining to unlock a mass shooter’s iPhones – By Rosie Perper (Business Insider) / Jan 13 2020
- Attorney General William Barr reignited a feud between Apple and the US government over its refusal to let officials access encrypted data on iPhones.
- He said Apple wasn’t doing enough to help the FBI access two phones used by Mohammed Alshamrani, the Saudi officer who opened fire in December on a naval base in Pensacola, Florida.
- Barr said the FBI needed encrypted information from Alshamrani’s iPhones to properly investigate the shooting, which officials on Monday declared was an act of terrorism.
Apple said it had helped as much as it could but would never code a “backdoor” to allow law enforcement access to users’ encrypted information. - The argument is effectively a replay of a 2015 struggle between Apple and the Obama administration, which wanted to access a cellphone after the mass shooting in San Bernardino, California.
- Apple has said such backdoors would make all users’ phones vulnerable to bad actors.
The fight for privacy between Apple and the White House was reignited this week when Attorney General William Barr publicly accused Apple of not doing enough to help the FBI access a mass shooter’s cellphones.
Barr told reporters on Monday that Apple had given “no substantive assistance” to the investigation into the December 6 shooting at a naval base in Pensacola, Florida.
Mohammed Alshamrani, a visiting officer in the Saudi air force, killed three people and wounded others before he was shot dead by authorities.
Barr on Monday declared the shooting an “act of terrorism” and said Alshamrani was motivated by jihadist ideology.
He said the FBI asked Apple last week to help unlock two iPhones used by the shooter. Apple has refused the request, however, citing a long-standing view that breaking encryption on a single phone would compromise all users’ privacy.
The dispute is a close parallel to a standoff between Apple and the Obama administration in 2015 in the wake of a mass shooting in San Bernardino, California.
An epochal clash over the limits of privacy
A protester with an iPhone that says “No Entry” outside the Apple Store on 5th Avenue in New York City in 2016. Bryan Thomas/Getty Images
The San Bernardino shooting took place at a social-services agency and left 16 people dead, including the two shooters.
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