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The article describes the Justice Dept. doing exactly what has been so widely predicted on HN and elsewhere. Doesn't seem like good timing on the government's

by jrapdx3 11y ago

The article describes the Justice Dept. doing exactly what has been so widely predicted on HN and elsewhere. Doesn't seem like good timing on the government's part to publicly announce the intention to seek numerous iPhone "unlockings". Rather it plays into Apple's argument about unleashing a torrent of court-ordered demands which will have adverse consequences for security. Legal minds should weigh in, but I'm thinking the only effective remedy is going to be congressional action, to pass law that defines the limits of court discretion re: forcing firms' assistance breaching their carefully constructed security/privacy systems. This news prompts me to write my representative and senators and strongly urge them to support enacting this form of protective legislation. If there's enough of an outcry from the electorate there's a far greater chance of putting sensible policies in place. The fact it's an election year can only make voicing our concerns all the more effective.

edraferi 11y ago
It makes total sense that the givernment would use it's forensic capabilities whenever the need arises. The question at hand is: "can the All Writs Act compel a company to proactively defeat its own security measures?" The answer will apply to all cases. The more important question is "Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? I suspect we'll ultimately wind up with mainstream device manufacturers maintaining some kind of per-device master key that they turn over when ordered. This will enable government to access data in the typical case. Including foreign governments. Sophisticated bad guys will continue to use zero knowledge software, which government will attack by other means. The per-device master keys will be compromised eventually, which will force enterprises to upgrade their fleeta but normals won't care.
- ktRolster 11y ago
  The best way (IMO) is to make it unbreakable, and off by default. Then the people who care about privacy can have it, and the justice department can be happy most of the time.
  - lowpro 11y ago
    But does that imply that the technically inept don't deserve privacy, even if they want it? I think it does, and is therefore an unviable solution.
  - mratzloff 11y ago
    Then the people who care about privacy become targets.
    - id 11y ago
      They are already targets.
      - danudey 11y ago
        If it's opt-in, then encryption on your phone leads to 'what are you trying to hide?' If it's on-by-default, then everyone has their phone encrypted, and it's never suspicious.
      - lostlogin 11y ago
        Everyone cares about privacy. What are you saying exactly?
        bespoke_engnr 11y ago
        Perhaps the middle part of the argument is missing? People who care about privacy == people who use encryption. People who use encryption already have all of their communications flagged and stored, if the rumors are true.
        lostlogin 11y ago
        I disagree. This surely applies to the tech sector, but what about the wider world? Many people have all sorts of privacy habits (close curtains, have tall fences and hedges, they shred their mail or don't discuss wages, etc) yet don't understand or practice anything similar in the digital world.
- huuu 11y ago
  We also will wind up (already have) with more smart terrorists who hide data in better places. So the only people who lost are we (again).
  - newjersey 11y ago
    As a devil's advocate, couldn't we say the same thing about guns?
    - mcphage 11y ago
      We can. But we'd still reduce the accidental gun deaths tremendously—as well as killings by people who weren't previously criminals. Yes, we probably won't get the guns away from criminals—there are too many guns, and they've been around for too long. But we'll still reduce the deaths.
- awesomepantsm 11y ago
  >Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? I don't think that's a good question at all. Regardless of the ruling, they aren't going to up and declare encryption illegal. You can't throw a legal requirement at math to stop working.
  - Bud 11y ago
    This is dangerously naive. You think the government can't do something illogical? You just wait for it. You think the government can't outlaw the use of something, even if it's an ineffectual half-measure that does more harm than good? Were you alive during the "War on Drugs"?
    - leonatan 11y ago
      Why "were"? We are still alive, humanity is still suffering from the "war on drugs".
    - orionblastar 11y ago
      If you studied history they passed prohibition that banned alcohol. It did not work as bootleggers and gangsters would make their own alcohol and sell it at hidden clubs. Stores would sell fruit juice next to sugar and yeast and all the customer had to do was find a way to mix them to make alcohol. They eventually had to repeal Prohibition. When they banned drugs, they did the same thing. It is prohibition all over again. Criminals and gangs got into dealing drugs for money and people can't give them up. The war on drugs doesn't work because the CIA makes money from drug lords, and gangs and criminals make a lot of money selling drugs on the street. I managed to grow up without getting into drug but during the 1970s and 1980s there was a lot of peer pressure into doing drugs with others when I was growing up. It has become a social thing. Many prisoners are in prison for using drugs. So our prison system is over crowded as a result. All the war on drugs did was imprison drug users and not go after the gangs and dealers. The government doesn't get privacy rights. So they violate privacy in order to crack encryption on an iPhone via a backdoor or master key or modified iOS that gets rid of passcode penalties and brute forces the passcode. They only see getting the data off the iPhone to use as evidence, and don't care that it causes iPhone users to lose their privacy and make iPhones less secure. The government isn't logical about these things, judges and politicians are for the most part not tech savvy enough to understand the technology and the need for privacy. They studied law, and other things, and not technology in the most case to understand how it works. They see getting evidence on terrorists as a priority and don't care what rights it violates. They can pass a law that pressed criminal charges at Apple employees and management for not helping out and try to force them to do what they say. We faced the same issues on the war on terror that required domestic spying and collection of metadata via the US Patriot Act.
- m_mueller 11y ago
  > "Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? IMO yes and here is how I'd implement this given a secure enclave: 1) Have Apple generate a device specific key that unlocks the device without pass code. 2) The key gets encrypted with an Apple held master key and printed on the inside of the device, e.g. a sticker on the chipset. Note that at this point, the device is as secure as before if we assume that someone who gets the Apple certifier key can exchange the secure enclave software at will. 3) Apple should ensure that the unencrypted key gets deleted from all of their systems after it was printed, to ensure plausible deniability. 4) The process for accessing the data on a specific device becomes simple - law enforcement needs to be in possession of (A) the device and (B) a court order. Apple will decrypt the key if forced by court order.
  - imrehg 11y ago
    And if the Apple master key is ever revealed or stolen, everyone's phone can be decrypted. So yeah, this plan still compromises the general security of the device.
    - m_mueller 11y ago
      As is the case with Apple's software certifier key. AFAIK this is what we currently have to assume since Apple doesn't specify how the update process for the secure enclave works. If this is the case it doesn't change anything, the certifier key is already like a master key.
      - pfg 11y ago
        Replacing the firmware (Secure Enclave or not) with a version that doesn't include rate-limits and auto-wipe isn't the same as having a crypto backdoor. Right now, your data is still protected by the complexity of your passphrase. This is not true for your scenario.
  - danieldk 11y ago
    4) The process for accessing the data on a specific device becomes simple - law enforcement needs to be in possession of (A) the device and (B) a court order. Apple will decrypt the key if forced by court order. I think, we can assume that up till now, Apple has its private keys protected on some disconnected machine in a HSM, perhaps multiple HSMs, that are only accessible with very restricted access. When there is a gold iOS build, some of the key personal will go through a security procedure to get the build signed. Now suppose that such a procedure is put in place. And you get requests from US courts and Western European courts[1]. Once it's there, there will probably be hundreds, perhaps thousands of daily requests. It suddenly becomes undoable to keep the same security procedures. More people need access to the master key to handle all the requests for which there is a court order. Or even worse: there has to be an semi-automated procedure to handle such requests. In any case, any such procedure will weaken the security of iOS devices significantly. Since Apple's master key is so extremely valuable, it will be an extremely attractive target for attacks (in the semi-automatic scenario); or it's easier to find a corrupt person to leak the keys. Since people store anything from personal photos, access to bank accounts, to business plans on their phones, we should move into the direction of making crypto systems stronger, not intentionally weakening them. [1] Let's avoid the slippery slope that this would trigger for not-so-nice regimes for a moment. Although, once such a backdoor is there, it will happen.
- ascorbic 11y ago
  The other question is if it's legal for a company to design their devices so that it is technically impossible for them to comply. Is there any practical reason why the secure enclave could not be programmed such that any firmware update to the enclave requires the PIN, and if not it erases the key. That way Apple is still able to make updates to the enclave, but cannot be compelled to bypass security restrictions on locked devices.
  - bryanrasmussen 11y ago
    It would be difficult to design a law in a Napoleonic system that disallowed that(designing their devices so that it is technically impossible for them to comply), although in the American system I guess it would be possible.
    - kabdib 11y ago
      We've come close to this already (mandated Clipper chip). Which would have been a disaster, in many areas. IIRC, the ITAR rules even prohibited systems that lacked crypto, but that had pluggable APIs which permitted crypto to be added later (e.g., by the end-user). It's hard to see how legislation to the same effect would pass constitutional muster, but it's a gamble, and the administration has little to lose.
  - amatix 11y ago
    Pure speculation: I wonder if v2 of the Secure Enclave was going to do just that, but Apple wanted to make sure there weren't glaring software flaws in v1 before they lock themselves out of the chip for good.
- nickysielicki 11y ago
  > "can the All Writs Act compel a company to proactively defeat its own security measures?" I think there's a qualifier on there that you're missing. It's not just if the All Writs Act can compel a company to undermine their security measures. It's "if a company can undermine their security measures, can the All Writs Act compel them to do so?" I think the answer is, arguably, "yes." But that's a meaningful distinction because the 5C lacks trusted execution, and newer iPhones have it. I just read an article where Apple claims the precedent set in this case could force them to undermine phones with trusted execution. And that's probably true, too, IFF they can undermine it themselves. But the All Writs Act certainly cannot bar a company from creating something that cannot be undermined. So they'll make firmware that can't be modified without wiping the device.
- mattlutze 11y ago
  > The more important question is "Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? The government already does have access to these citizens' data. That data simply has the quality of having been encrypted. If I have printed encrypted text and lock it in my home safe, when the government gets a court order to search my house, they'll have complete access to those documents. They can't compel me to decipher those documents though, it's on them to break the encryption. It's the same situation here. Here, Apple may be able to perform that decription service for the government. The question to me is, should the government be legally able to press a person or firm into service?
  - comex 11y ago
    If the encrypted data is stored on a hard drive in that safe, the government can compel production in some cases, blocked mainly by a legal quirk involving the Fifth Amendment: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#United_St... IANAL, but I think your original hypothetical would be roughly analogous. I think the difference in this Apple case is essentially the amount of effort required (producing a password versus actually writing [a modicum of] new OS software), but I could be wrong.
    - mattlutze 11y ago
      My NAL understanding there was that, in cases where the government has already seen the evidence, decription is not self-incrimination. But in general excepting that, they can't compel the owner in the possibility that doing so would force the owner to self-incriminate.
  - upofadown 11y ago
    I think a better analogy for this sort of thing is an unknown location. It's like you took some unencrypted text and hid it in a tree in a national forest. Everyone strongly suspects that the unencrypted text existed in the past. It's just that only one person knows how to access that text in the present. The problem with the locked box analogy is that it implies that the cypertext is in some way equivalent to the plain text. In practice that isn't really true. If you don't have the key you don't actually have the plain text. Nothing says you can't look for it if you want. You could even hire a company to help you look. Can you force a company to look if that search would be against their business interests?
- p01926 11y ago
  > Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? No. And that's both impossible and a massive compromise. This case helps us tackle that first question. Here the murderer's personal phone and computer hard drives were destroyed — rendering them "above/beyond the law". Just because some data is digital doesn't place it in some special legal realm more important than shreddable/burnable paper or the air secret conversations were spoken into. There are fundamental limits to recoverability. If technology companies are to be forced to maintain vulnerabilities because governments see all their customers as potential terrorists, the industry is doomed. The real problem here is although terrorism will never touch the average citizen anywhere near the extent of other tragedies like illness, accidents or natural disasters, the media treat it like it's the single most important issue — making people fear for their lives is good business. I'd die before sacrificing freedom of speech every time, but the news business just seems too like racketeering. We need to fight the fear.
  - andrepd 11y ago
    Why not? Police can search your house or seize your mail with a court order. Why can't they search your phone or computer?
    - 1024core 11y ago
      If they can get in. Suppose your house is made of some material (10' thick steel?) which cannot be broken into without a use of a nuke (bear with me....). Is the government allowed to nuke that neighborhood just to get into the house?
    - matwood 11y ago
      They can search my phone and computer with a court order. What they should not be able to do is force companies to compromise proper encryption so they always have the ability to find something.
      - sliverstorm 11y ago
- cturner 11y ago
  I wonder if there's a way of using software licensing to bypass the issue. Consider this. What if there was a piece of encryption software where the copyright was held in the UK (i.e. not in the US). The key thing about this encryption library: it has a special license. One of its clauses says that it may not be edited, it may only be compiled by clang, may only be distributed in the form that results from a good-faith compilation under clang, and that - as a condition of use - the distributor may not implement workarounds. The US court would have no jurisdiction for ruling on the actions of the copyright owner. And Apple could defend its behaviour by saying that intellectual property law means that it is not within its rights/mandate to modify the included software.
  - rlpb 11y ago
    A US court can order Apple to do what it likes inside US jurisdiction, including things that would normally be illegal in the US.
    - kelnos 11y ago
      Citation? It seems pretty unbelievable that a US court can order someone to do something that violates US law.
      - roel_v 11y ago
        What is it you are seeking a 'citation' for? This is so obvious nobody with a legal background would question it, let alone write about it. The gp is so silly it doesn't warrant discussion. Law is not a logic game with a closed rule set, it's nonsensical to reason based on that assumption.
        kelnos 11y ago
        Just asking for an example. I don't have a legal background. No need to get defensive about it.
      - knughit 11y ago
- the8472 11y ago
  > It makes total sense that the givernment would use it's forensic capabilities whenever the need arises. Assuming you mean "its" then apple's capabilities are not the government's. The government could physically attack the chips holding the data instead. They're just risk-/effort-averse and would like others do the work for them.
- Sir_Substance 11y ago
  >I suspect we'll ultimately wind up with mainstream device manufacturers maintaining some kind of per-device master key that they turn over when ordered. It will be impossible to secure that database. Any number and size of bribes would be worth spreading around to gain a dump of it. Once I have a dump, you're up shit creek because you're faced with changing every key of every device you've ever sold to resecure them. However, any key changing mechanism you create is an exploitation vector criminals can use to randomly scramble their "master key" and not report the new one to you, and again, any certs you use to secure this process will become v cost effective to bribe for. So we're left with a situation where one breach screws everyone and it hurts legitimate users way more than the criminals it is targeted at. Back doors are back doors man. Anyone can use the door handle, once it exists.
  - Scea91 11y ago
    These kind of master keys already exists so it is not something hypothetical. I am talking about the private keys of trusted root certification authorities. If it would be as easy to get them as you say nobody would probably use TLS since it would be useless.
    - mirimir 11y ago
      Well, TLS with "trusted" CAs is useless, for extreme threat models.
      - csallen 11y ago
        Care to elaborate?
        mirimir 11y ago
        You're vulnerable to MitM if adversaries have issued fraudulent certificates for sites that you use. And we know that this has happened, more than once.
        11y ago
- sp332 11y ago
  It's not actually his phone. It was his "work phone" and it belongs to the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health, who is very willing for the FBI to read the data.
- emergentcypher 11y ago
  Howabout the question is, should Congress repeal the All Writs Act.
  - mcphage 11y ago
    Probably not. But they (or the courts) should make it clear what actions it can be used to compel, and what actions it can't be used to compel.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
newman314 11y ago
What's alarming is that sites like The Verge are posting articles like this [1] essentially condoning the FBI's position. I would have expected them to know better. [1] http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11100152/apple-fbi-terrorism-marketing-strategy http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11100152/apple-fbi-terrori...
- jsmthrowaway 11y ago
  I read the entire article and I cannot find basis to support your position on it. Was it edited?
- leonatan 11y ago
  Conspiracy theory: The Verge is still angry that Apple enabled content blocking, thus allowing users to remove most of their adtech bloat.
hollander 11y ago
The best respons is already a reality: iPhone 6 with Secure Enclave - or making it impossible to unlock the phone with a hack and with brute force. I hope Google and Microsoft follow suit, and make this a requirement for future versions of Android and Windows Phone.
- Aissen 11y ago
  Nope, Secure Enclave is updateable, even Apple said so.
  - 4ad 11y ago
    Do we know what can the software running on the secure enclave do exactly? If the software itself doesn't have access to the master key (a.i. can't read it directly), and if the slow authentication is inherent from running the algorithm on the chip, rather than a having been slowed down artificially, then even an update to the secure enclave would not compromise the security of the system. Do we know exactly what the secure enclave software can do and what it can't do?
    - Aissen 11y ago
      It does not matter for the case at hand, which is FBI wanting to bruteforce the code without 10-try erase.
      - 4ad 11y ago
        Yes, it does not matter for the case at hand, but it is very important in general, and it has been brought into attention up the thread.
    - 542458 11y ago
      > if the slow authentication is inherent from running the algorithm on the chip, rather than a having been slowed down artificially There is no known cryptographic algorithm that provides inherently increasing times. The slowdown is entirely artificial, and it is believed that an update could remove it.
DavideNL 11y ago
> "Rather it plays into Apple's argument about unleashing a torrent of court-ordered demands which will have adverse consequences for security." I wonder if that would have negative economic consequences for the US, e.g. tech companies that value privacy moving to Europe or elsewhere and customers avoiding US tech products. If so, i imagine that would probably be the best reason for the US government to not proceed with this?
vox_mollis 11y ago
the only effective remedy is going to be congressional action We are well, well beyond that point. This will never happen, given the authoritarian and fearful bent of the electorate and the elected. The 3% solution is the only truly effective remedy.
dahart 11y ago
> Doesn't seem like good timing on the government's part to publicly announce the intention to seek numerous iPhone "unlockings" That was my immediate gut reaction, that it looks bad because Apple objections are proving true. But now I wonder if the timing maybe works to their advantage, and the admission they want to use phone cracking everywhere is perhaps a very smart strategy. To technologists and privacy advocates, this might look like an admission of guilt. To the public at large, and the entire country, this might actually be a mountain of evidence that phone cracking is absolutely necessary, something we can't do without if otherwise phones are going to become unreadable by the "good guys". For better or worse (and IMO it's worse) this might be a very strong argument with very good timing.
persusta 11y ago
> This news prompts me to write my representative and senators and strongly urge them to support enacting this form of protective legislation. Have they ever seemed to give a fuck about letters from any little peasant?
Kinnard 11y ago
I disagree. I think the only effective remedy is strong, successful cryptography.

by jrapdx3 11y ago

edraferi 11y ago

It makes total sense that the givernment would use it's forensic capabilities whenever the need arises. The question at hand is: "can the All Writs Act compel a company to proactively defeat its own security measures?" The answer will apply to all cases. The more important question is "Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? I suspect we'll ultimately wind up with mainstream device manufacturers maintaining some kind of per-device master key that they turn over when ordered. This will enable government to access data in the typical case. Including foreign governments. Sophisticated bad guys will continue to use zero knowledge software, which government will attack by other means. The per-device master keys will be compromised eventually, which will force enterprises to upgrade their fleeta but normals won't care.

ktRolster 11y ago
The best way (IMO) is to make it unbreakable, and off by default. Then the people who care about privacy can have it, and the justice department can be happy most of the time.
- lowpro 11y ago
  But does that imply that the technically inept don't deserve privacy, even if they want it? I think it does, and is therefore an unviable solution.
- mratzloff 11y ago
  Then the people who care about privacy become targets.
  - id 11y ago
    They are already targets.
    - danudey 11y ago
      If it's opt-in, then encryption on your phone leads to 'what are you trying to hide?' If it's on-by-default, then everyone has their phone encrypted, and it's never suspicious.
    - lostlogin 11y ago
      Everyone cares about privacy. What are you saying exactly?
      - bespoke_engnr 11y ago
        Perhaps the middle part of the argument is missing? People who care about privacy == people who use encryption. People who use encryption already have all of their communications flagged and stored, if the rumors are true.
        lostlogin 11y ago
        I disagree. This surely applies to the tech sector, but what about the wider world? Many people have all sorts of privacy habits (close curtains, have tall fences and hedges, they shred their mail or don't discuss wages, etc) yet don't understand or practice anything similar in the digital world.
huuu 11y ago
We also will wind up (already have) with more smart terrorists who hide data in better places. So the only people who lost are we (again).
- newjersey 11y ago
  As a devil's advocate, couldn't we say the same thing about guns?
  - mcphage 11y ago
    We can. But we'd still reduce the accidental gun deaths tremendously—as well as killings by people who weren't previously criminals. Yes, we probably won't get the guns away from criminals—there are too many guns, and they've been around for too long. But we'll still reduce the deaths.
awesomepantsm 11y ago
>Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? I don't think that's a good question at all. Regardless of the ruling, they aren't going to up and declare encryption illegal. You can't throw a legal requirement at math to stop working.
- Bud 11y ago
  This is dangerously naive. You think the government can't do something illogical? You just wait for it. You think the government can't outlaw the use of something, even if it's an ineffectual half-measure that does more harm than good? Were you alive during the "War on Drugs"?
  - leonatan 11y ago
    Why "were"? We are still alive, humanity is still suffering from the "war on drugs".
  - orionblastar 11y ago
    If you studied history they passed prohibition that banned alcohol. It did not work as bootleggers and gangsters would make their own alcohol and sell it at hidden clubs. Stores would sell fruit juice next to sugar and yeast and all the customer had to do was find a way to mix them to make alcohol. They eventually had to repeal Prohibition. When they banned drugs, they did the same thing. It is prohibition all over again. Criminals and gangs got into dealing drugs for money and people can't give them up. The war on drugs doesn't work because the CIA makes money from drug lords, and gangs and criminals make a lot of money selling drugs on the street. I managed to grow up without getting into drug but during the 1970s and 1980s there was a lot of peer pressure into doing drugs with others when I was growing up. It has become a social thing. Many prisoners are in prison for using drugs. So our prison system is over crowded as a result. All the war on drugs did was imprison drug users and not go after the gangs and dealers. The government doesn't get privacy rights. So they violate privacy in order to crack encryption on an iPhone via a backdoor or master key or modified iOS that gets rid of passcode penalties and brute forces the passcode. They only see getting the data off the iPhone to use as evidence, and don't care that it causes iPhone users to lose their privacy and make iPhones less secure. The government isn't logical about these things, judges and politicians are for the most part not tech savvy enough to understand the technology and the need for privacy. They studied law, and other things, and not technology in the most case to understand how it works. They see getting evidence on terrorists as a priority and don't care what rights it violates. They can pass a law that pressed criminal charges at Apple employees and management for not helping out and try to force them to do what they say. We faced the same issues on the war on terror that required domestic spying and collection of metadata via the US Patriot Act.
m_mueller 11y ago
> "Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? IMO yes and here is how I'd implement this given a secure enclave: 1) Have Apple generate a device specific key that unlocks the device without pass code. 2) The key gets encrypted with an Apple held master key and printed on the inside of the device, e.g. a sticker on the chipset. Note that at this point, the device is as secure as before if we assume that someone who gets the Apple certifier key can exchange the secure enclave software at will. 3) Apple should ensure that the unencrypted key gets deleted from all of their systems after it was printed, to ensure plausible deniability. 4) The process for accessing the data on a specific device becomes simple - law enforcement needs to be in possession of (A) the device and (B) a court order. Apple will decrypt the key if forced by court order.
- imrehg 11y ago
  And if the Apple master key is ever revealed or stolen, everyone's phone can be decrypted. So yeah, this plan still compromises the general security of the device.
  - m_mueller 11y ago
    As is the case with Apple's software certifier key. AFAIK this is what we currently have to assume since Apple doesn't specify how the update process for the secure enclave works. If this is the case it doesn't change anything, the certifier key is already like a master key.
    - pfg 11y ago
      Replacing the firmware (Secure Enclave or not) with a version that doesn't include rate-limits and auto-wipe isn't the same as having a crypto backdoor. Right now, your data is still protected by the complexity of your passphrase. This is not true for your scenario.
- danieldk 11y ago
  4) The process for accessing the data on a specific device becomes simple - law enforcement needs to be in possession of (A) the device and (B) a court order. Apple will decrypt the key if forced by court order. I think, we can assume that up till now, Apple has its private keys protected on some disconnected machine in a HSM, perhaps multiple HSMs, that are only accessible with very restricted access. When there is a gold iOS build, some of the key personal will go through a security procedure to get the build signed. Now suppose that such a procedure is put in place. And you get requests from US courts and Western European courts[1]. Once it's there, there will probably be hundreds, perhaps thousands of daily requests. It suddenly becomes undoable to keep the same security procedures. More people need access to the master key to handle all the requests for which there is a court order. Or even worse: there has to be an semi-automated procedure to handle such requests. In any case, any such procedure will weaken the security of iOS devices significantly. Since Apple's master key is so extremely valuable, it will be an extremely attractive target for attacks (in the semi-automatic scenario); or it's easier to find a corrupt person to leak the keys. Since people store anything from personal photos, access to bank accounts, to business plans on their phones, we should move into the direction of making crypto systems stronger, not intentionally weakening them. [1] Let's avoid the slippery slope that this would trigger for not-so-nice regimes for a moment. Although, once such a backdoor is there, it will happen.
ascorbic 11y ago
The other question is if it's legal for a company to design their devices so that it is technically impossible for them to comply. Is there any practical reason why the secure enclave could not be programmed such that any firmware update to the enclave requires the PIN, and if not it erases the key. That way Apple is still able to make updates to the enclave, but cannot be compelled to bypass security restrictions on locked devices.
- bryanrasmussen 11y ago
  It would be difficult to design a law in a Napoleonic system that disallowed that(designing their devices so that it is technically impossible for them to comply), although in the American system I guess it would be possible.
  - kabdib 11y ago
    We've come close to this already (mandated Clipper chip). Which would have been a disaster, in many areas. IIRC, the ITAR rules even prohibited systems that lacked crypto, but that had pluggable APIs which permitted crypto to be added later (e.g., by the end-user). It's hard to see how legislation to the same effect would pass constitutional muster, but it's a gamble, and the administration has little to lose.
- amatix 11y ago
  Pure speculation: I wonder if v2 of the Secure Enclave was going to do just that, but Apple wanted to make sure there weren't glaring software flaws in v1 before they lock themselves out of the chip for good.
nickysielicki 11y ago
> "can the All Writs Act compel a company to proactively defeat its own security measures?" I think there's a qualifier on there that you're missing. It's not just if the All Writs Act can compel a company to undermine their security measures. It's "if a company can undermine their security measures, can the All Writs Act compel them to do so?" I think the answer is, arguably, "yes." But that's a meaningful distinction because the 5C lacks trusted execution, and newer iPhones have it. I just read an article where Apple claims the precedent set in this case could force them to undermine phones with trusted execution. And that's probably true, too, IFF they can undermine it themselves. But the All Writs Act certainly cannot bar a company from creating something that cannot be undermined. So they'll make firmware that can't be modified without wiping the device.
mattlutze 11y ago
> The more important question is "Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? The government already does have access to these citizens' data. That data simply has the quality of having been encrypted. If I have printed encrypted text and lock it in my home safe, when the government gets a court order to search my house, they'll have complete access to those documents. They can't compel me to decipher those documents though, it's on them to break the encryption. It's the same situation here. Here, Apple may be able to perform that decription service for the government. The question to me is, should the government be legally able to press a person or firm into service?
- comex 11y ago
  If the encrypted data is stored on a hard drive in that safe, the government can compel production in some cases, blocked mainly by a legal quirk involving the Fifth Amendment: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#United_St... IANAL, but I think your original hypothetical would be roughly analogous. I think the difference in this Apple case is essentially the amount of effort required (producing a password versus actually writing [a modicum of] new OS software), but I could be wrong.
  - mattlutze 11y ago
    My NAL understanding there was that, in cases where the government has already seen the evidence, decription is not self-incrimination. But in general excepting that, they can't compel the owner in the possibility that doing so would force the owner to self-incriminate.
- upofadown 11y ago
  I think a better analogy for this sort of thing is an unknown location. It's like you took some unencrypted text and hid it in a tree in a national forest. Everyone strongly suspects that the unencrypted text existed in the past. It's just that only one person knows how to access that text in the present. The problem with the locked box analogy is that it implies that the cypertext is in some way equivalent to the plain text. In practice that isn't really true. If you don't have the key you don't actually have the plain text. Nothing says you can't look for it if you want. You could even hire a company to help you look. Can you force a company to look if that search would be against their business interests?
p01926 11y ago
> Should the government be able to access citizen's digital data with a court order? And if so, how can that be enabled without compromising the general security of the device? No. And that's both impossible and a massive compromise. This case helps us tackle that first question. Here the murderer's personal phone and computer hard drives were destroyed — rendering them "above/beyond the law". Just because some data is digital doesn't place it in some special legal realm more important than shreddable/burnable paper or the air secret conversations were spoken into. There are fundamental limits to recoverability. If technology companies are to be forced to maintain vulnerabilities because governments see all their customers as potential terrorists, the industry is doomed. The real problem here is although terrorism will never touch the average citizen anywhere near the extent of other tragedies like illness, accidents or natural disasters, the media treat it like it's the single most important issue — making people fear for their lives is good business. I'd die before sacrificing freedom of speech every time, but the news business just seems too like racketeering. We need to fight the fear.
- andrepd 11y ago
  Why not? Police can search your house or seize your mail with a court order. Why can't they search your phone or computer?
  - 1024core 11y ago
    If they can get in. Suppose your house is made of some material (10' thick steel?) which cannot be broken into without a use of a nuke (bear with me....). Is the government allowed to nuke that neighborhood just to get into the house?
  - matwood 11y ago
    They can search my phone and computer with a court order. What they should not be able to do is force companies to compromise proper encryption so they always have the ability to find something.
    - sliverstorm 11y ago
cturner 11y ago
I wonder if there's a way of using software licensing to bypass the issue. Consider this. What if there was a piece of encryption software where the copyright was held in the UK (i.e. not in the US). The key thing about this encryption library: it has a special license. One of its clauses says that it may not be edited, it may only be compiled by clang, may only be distributed in the form that results from a good-faith compilation under clang, and that - as a condition of use - the distributor may not implement workarounds. The US court would have no jurisdiction for ruling on the actions of the copyright owner. And Apple could defend its behaviour by saying that intellectual property law means that it is not within its rights/mandate to modify the included software.
- rlpb 11y ago
  A US court can order Apple to do what it likes inside US jurisdiction, including things that would normally be illegal in the US.
  - kelnos 11y ago
    Citation? It seems pretty unbelievable that a US court can order someone to do something that violates US law.
    - roel_v 11y ago
      What is it you are seeking a 'citation' for? This is so obvious nobody with a legal background would question it, let alone write about it. The gp is so silly it doesn't warrant discussion. Law is not a logic game with a closed rule set, it's nonsensical to reason based on that assumption.
      - kelnos 11y ago
        Just asking for an example. I don't have a legal background. No need to get defensive about it.
    - knughit 11y ago
the8472 11y ago
> It makes total sense that the givernment would use it's forensic capabilities whenever the need arises. Assuming you mean "its" then apple's capabilities are not the government's. The government could physically attack the chips holding the data instead. They're just risk-/effort-averse and would like others do the work for them.
Sir_Substance 11y ago
>I suspect we'll ultimately wind up with mainstream device manufacturers maintaining some kind of per-device master key that they turn over when ordered. It will be impossible to secure that database. Any number and size of bribes would be worth spreading around to gain a dump of it. Once I have a dump, you're up shit creek because you're faced with changing every key of every device you've ever sold to resecure them. However, any key changing mechanism you create is an exploitation vector criminals can use to randomly scramble their "master key" and not report the new one to you, and again, any certs you use to secure this process will become v cost effective to bribe for. So we're left with a situation where one breach screws everyone and it hurts legitimate users way more than the criminals it is targeted at. Back doors are back doors man. Anyone can use the door handle, once it exists.
- Scea91 11y ago
  These kind of master keys already exists so it is not something hypothetical. I am talking about the private keys of trusted root certification authorities. If it would be as easy to get them as you say nobody would probably use TLS since it would be useless.
  - mirimir 11y ago
    Well, TLS with "trusted" CAs is useless, for extreme threat models.
    - csallen 11y ago
      Care to elaborate?
      - mirimir 11y ago
        You're vulnerable to MitM if adversaries have issued fraudulent certificates for sites that you use. And we know that this has happened, more than once.
        11y ago
sp332 11y ago
It's not actually his phone. It was his "work phone" and it belongs to the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health, who is very willing for the FBI to read the data.
emergentcypher 11y ago
Howabout the question is, should Congress repeal the All Writs Act.
- mcphage 11y ago
  Probably not. But they (or the courts) should make it clear what actions it can be used to compel, and what actions it can't be used to compel.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

newman314 11y ago

What's alarming is that sites like The Verge are posting articles like this [1] essentially condoning the FBI's position. I would have expected them to know better. [1] http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11100152/apple-fbi-terrorism-marketing-strategy http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/23/11100152/apple-fbi-terrori...

jsmthrowaway 11y ago
I read the entire article and I cannot find basis to support your position on it. Was it edited?
leonatan 11y ago
Conspiracy theory: The Verge is still angry that Apple enabled content blocking, thus allowing users to remove most of their adtech bloat.

hollander 11y ago

The best respons is already a reality: iPhone 6 with Secure Enclave - or making it impossible to unlock the phone with a hack and with brute force. I hope Google and Microsoft follow suit, and make this a requirement for future versions of Android and Windows Phone.

Aissen 11y ago
Nope, Secure Enclave is updateable, even Apple said so.
- 4ad 11y ago
  Do we know what can the software running on the secure enclave do exactly? If the software itself doesn't have access to the master key (a.i. can't read it directly), and if the slow authentication is inherent from running the algorithm on the chip, rather than a having been slowed down artificially, then even an update to the secure enclave would not compromise the security of the system. Do we know exactly what the secure enclave software can do and what it can't do?
  - Aissen 11y ago
    It does not matter for the case at hand, which is FBI wanting to bruteforce the code without 10-try erase.
    - 4ad 11y ago
      Yes, it does not matter for the case at hand, but it is very important in general, and it has been brought into attention up the thread.
  - 542458 11y ago
    > if the slow authentication is inherent from running the algorithm on the chip, rather than a having been slowed down artificially There is no known cryptographic algorithm that provides inherently increasing times. The slowdown is entirely artificial, and it is believed that an update could remove it.

DavideNL 11y ago

> "Rather it plays into Apple's argument about unleashing a torrent of court-ordered demands which will have adverse consequences for security." I wonder if that would have negative economic consequences for the US, e.g. tech companies that value privacy moving to Europe or elsewhere and customers avoiding US tech products. If so, i imagine that would probably be the best reason for the US government to not proceed with this?

vox_mollis 11y ago

the only effective remedy is going to be congressional action We are well, well beyond that point. This will never happen, given the authoritarian and fearful bent of the electorate and the elected. The 3% solution is the only truly effective remedy.

dahart 11y ago

> Doesn't seem like good timing on the government's part to publicly announce the intention to seek numerous iPhone "unlockings" That was my immediate gut reaction, that it looks bad because Apple objections are proving true. But now I wonder if the timing maybe works to their advantage, and the admission they want to use phone cracking everywhere is perhaps a very smart strategy. To technologists and privacy advocates, this might look like an admission of guilt. To the public at large, and the entire country, this might actually be a mountain of evidence that phone cracking is absolutely necessary, something we can't do without if otherwise phones are going to become unreadable by the "good guys". For better or worse (and IMO it's worse) this might be a very strong argument with very good timing.

persusta 11y ago

> This news prompts me to write my representative and senators and strongly urge them to support enacting this form of protective legislation. Have they ever seemed to give a fuck about letters from any little peasant?

Kinnard 11y ago

I disagree. I think the only effective remedy is strong, successful cryptography.