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I'm putting on my pragmatism hat. I can't understand why Apple are fighting this. They're essentially forcing the government into resorting to legal mechanisms

by jfoster 11y ago

I'm putting on my pragmatism hat. I can't understand why Apple are fighting this. They're essentially forcing the government into resorting to legal mechanisms that will have longer term impacts. It's pretty clear to nearly everyone that this phone belonged to someone who committed a terrorist attack. The data on it may prove useful in preventing future attacks. If Apple were being cooperative, they could create the mechanism to get the data off the phone, have the FBI hand over the phone so they could do that for them, (optionally) delete that version of the OS if there's a problem with it even existing, and no legal precedent would be set. The question of whether the FBI should be able to compel them wouldn't arise, because they would have been cooperating off their own accord. If the FBI asks them to do this to the iPhone of someone who is more likely to be innocent, perhaps then this debate should be had. For now, they have the means, can do it without setting a precedent, have a pretty good reason to do it, and can do it in isolation. They should just do it, in my opinion.

mpeg 11y ago
I don't think the FBI can or will hand over the phone, that would compromise their entire investigation. Besides, once the software exists and is signed by Apple, it's very hard to prove that all copies have been deleted.
- jfoster 11y ago
  It's difficult to imagine this recovery operation could happen if Apple never get access to the phone. Perhaps they could have representatives from both Apple & FBI present. Proving all copies are gone isn't possible; you can't prove non-existence. Ensuring extreme unlikelihood seems relatively straightforward, though. Make fewer copies, trusted personnel only, isolate the development to a particular location with no network access, etc. Naturally there'll be a risk that a copy survives, just as there's a risk that a contingent of rogue Apple employees are already working on it for the FBI.
snsr 11y ago
The phone belongs to San Bernadino County, and is administered by them. This entire effort is PR intended to set precedent or encourage new legislation.
DavidTWco 11y ago
It isn't as simple as creating the tool, read this blog post that was linked elsewhere in this thread that explains why they can't just create and delete the tool. http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5645 http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5645
smileysteve 11y ago
> The data on it may prove useful in preventing future attacks. The data on it may also not prove useful in preventing future attacks. Especially as it was a person's business (not primary) phone. The other issue here is that this will only grant safety insofar as terrorists don't do math or encryption themselves - and that could be through an app that they write or a foreign made android phone where they lock the bootloader with their own code signature.
panax 11y ago
Tuesday Adi Shamir at the RSA conference said that this is not the right case for this issue and that Apple should help the FBI in this particular case and I completely agree. Apple also has screwed up as well and should admit it. Apple would not even be able to comply with the FBI's request with the proper security architecture. The iPhone should require user authentication before updating the software/firmware. If it had required authentication first, then the FBI would need to enter the pin before installing any software, preventing them from installing this vulnerable version of the software to crack the pin. Then Apple would not be capable of helping the FBI in this way aside from hacking the iPhone. I hope that Apple fixes this problem by requiring user authentication before software updates so they can put this issue to rest. And it looks like they probably are ( http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/25/technology/apple-is-said-to-be-working-on-an-iphone-even-it-cant-hack.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/25/technology/apple-is-said-t... ) They can then avoid using this technique in the future and avoid putting their signing key at greater risk. From a security risk standpoint, Apple's arguments are fairly weak. They argue that this binary could potentially be leaked and used on other phones, but this would not be possible if they implement the solution I have already stated. Maybe an adversary could infect an OS with this code using a security vulnerability, but if they can do that then there are worse things they could already do. The best argument I have seen is that doing this will result in Apple trying to comply with requests from the government in bulk, and in doing so create an environment in which Apple signs many copies of this firmware on a much more frequent basis, an environment which would put their signing key at greater risk. Again they would not need to do this in this case if they fixed the authentication problem. Apple keeps trying to construe this as a backdoor but it isn't really a backdoor. It is a security vulnerability in Apple's security architecture and it is fixable. If Apple keeps pushing the backdoor issue then Congress may legislate on backdoors or the courts may make a decision on them, and likely not in our favor in this case. This is not the right battlefield for Crypto Wars 2.0. This is a high profile and emotionally driven case with a mass shooting in which much of the public will side with the FBI simply on this fact alone. The phone is the property of the government, the gunman is dead and all of these facts work in the FBI's favor. We should be fighting this on our terms and not the FBI's. Rep. Sessenbrenner was correct when he told Apple's lawyer during the hearing that "you are not going to like what will come out of Congress on this". If any legislation is passed we will most likely be in a worse situation than we are in now. The best thing Congress could do on this issue is nothing at all. And Apple is pushing them to take action.

by jfoster 11y ago

mpeg 11y ago

I don't think the FBI can or will hand over the phone, that would compromise their entire investigation. Besides, once the software exists and is signed by Apple, it's very hard to prove that all copies have been deleted.

jfoster 11y ago
It's difficult to imagine this recovery operation could happen if Apple never get access to the phone. Perhaps they could have representatives from both Apple & FBI present. Proving all copies are gone isn't possible; you can't prove non-existence. Ensuring extreme unlikelihood seems relatively straightforward, though. Make fewer copies, trusted personnel only, isolate the development to a particular location with no network access, etc. Naturally there'll be a risk that a copy survives, just as there's a risk that a contingent of rogue Apple employees are already working on it for the FBI.

snsr 11y ago

The phone belongs to San Bernadino County, and is administered by them. This entire effort is PR intended to set precedent or encourage new legislation.

DavidTWco 11y ago

It isn't as simple as creating the tool, read this blog post that was linked elsewhere in this thread that explains why they can't just create and delete the tool. http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5645 http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=5645

smileysteve 11y ago

> The data on it may prove useful in preventing future attacks. The data on it may also not prove useful in preventing future attacks. Especially as it was a person's business (not primary) phone. The other issue here is that this will only grant safety insofar as terrorists don't do math or encryption themselves - and that could be through an app that they write or a foreign made android phone where they lock the bootloader with their own code signature.

panax 11y ago

Tuesday Adi Shamir at the RSA conference said that this is not the right case for this issue and that Apple should help the FBI in this particular case and I completely agree. Apple also has screwed up as well and should admit it. Apple would not even be able to comply with the FBI's request with the proper security architecture. The iPhone should require user authentication before updating the software/firmware. If it had required authentication first, then the FBI would need to enter the pin before installing any software, preventing them from installing this vulnerable version of the software to crack the pin. Then Apple would not be capable of helping the FBI in this way aside from hacking the iPhone. I hope that Apple fixes this problem by requiring user authentication before software updates so they can put this issue to rest. And it looks like they probably are ( http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/25/technology/apple-is-said-to-be-working-on-an-iphone-even-it-cant-hack.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/25/technology/apple-is-said-t... ) They can then avoid using this technique in the future and avoid putting their signing key at greater risk. From a security risk standpoint, Apple's arguments are fairly weak. They argue that this binary could potentially be leaked and used on other phones, but this would not be possible if they implement the solution I have already stated. Maybe an adversary could infect an OS with this code using a security vulnerability, but if they can do that then there are worse things they could already do. The best argument I have seen is that doing this will result in Apple trying to comply with requests from the government in bulk, and in doing so create an environment in which Apple signs many copies of this firmware on a much more frequent basis, an environment which would put their signing key at greater risk. Again they would not need to do this in this case if they fixed the authentication problem. Apple keeps trying to construe this as a backdoor but it isn't really a backdoor. It is a security vulnerability in Apple's security architecture and it is fixable. If Apple keeps pushing the backdoor issue then Congress may legislate on backdoors or the courts may make a decision on them, and likely not in our favor in this case. This is not the right battlefield for Crypto Wars 2.0. This is a high profile and emotionally driven case with a mass shooting in which much of the public will side with the FBI simply on this fact alone. The phone is the property of the government, the gunman is dead and all of these facts work in the FBI's favor. We should be fighting this on our terms and not the FBI's. Rep. Sessenbrenner was correct when he told Apple's lawyer during the hearing that "you are not going to like what will come out of Congress on this". If any legislation is passed we will most likely be in a worse situation than we are in now. The best thing Congress could do on this issue is nothing at all. And Apple is pushing them to take action.