APPLE CORE News feature
INVESTIGATES
14 | MACFORMAT | APRIL 2020 macformat.com @macformatFor our latest
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see page 34!WRITTEN BY ALEX BLAKE
A
pple is well known for its dispute
with the FBI over its refusal to
unlock an iPhone used by the San
Bernardino shooter in the USA.
That dispute has led some people to characterise
Apple as being ‘anti-police’, a characterisation
that Apple vigorously denies.
For its part, Apple claims to comply with
lawful requests for appropriate customer data.
But what safeguards are in place to ensure the
company doesn’t just give away info freely or
inappropriately? And how does Apple balance
its customers’ privacy with the fight against
crime? We decided to investigate.
At the time of the San Bernardino incident, the
FBI demanded Apple create a piece of software
that could decrypt the shooter’s phone. Apple
refused, stating that creating a backdoor in its
software would put all of its users’ data at risk
from anyone who was able to exploit the backdoor.
Since then, Apple’s stance has remained
unchanged. The issue reared its head again in
January 2020 when the FBI again asked Apple tounlock the phone of a suspected shooter,
Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani. Apple again
refused, claiming it had already turned over
all the information it had access to.
In a statement, Apple said: “We have the
greatest respect for law enforcement and have
always worked cooperatively to help in their
investigations. When the FBI requested
information from us relating to this case a month
ago, we gave them all of the data in our possession
and we will continue to support them with the
data we have available.”
Apple’s argument goes that there is no such
thing as a “single-use” or “limited” backdoor; if the
police are able to bypass a device’s encryption and
security features, then criminals could potentially
do the same thing. This is an argument that has
also been made by numerous security experts,
as well as other large companies subject to data
requests, such as Facebook. For a company like
Apple that markets itself as a leader in privacy
protections, creating an exploitable backdoor
is an unacceptable state of affairs.How does the world’s biggest company aid law
enforcement while keeping your data protected?
Apple, privacy
and the fight
against crime