4 ms·
iCloud Data can be obtained with just a search warrant. The power of the All Writs Act is in making a company do work to assist in decrypting or accessing data,
by JamilD 11y ago
iCloud Data can be obtained with just a search warrant. The power of the All Writs Act is in making a company do work to assist in decrypting or accessing data, rather than just handing it over.
From Apple's Legal Process Guidelines [0]:
"It is further ordered that, to the extent that data on the Device is encrypted, Apple may provide a copy of the encrypted data to law enforcement but Apple is not required to attempt to decrypt, or otherwise enable law enforcement's attempts to access any encrypted data."
[0] http://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/law-enforcement-guidelines-us.pdf http://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/law-enforcement-guideline...
- devnull42 11y agoCorrect but they would not have had access to the the iCloud data without Apple doing work (Resetting password or handing over a copy of the data) The original comment is correct.
- JamilD 11y agoMy understanding (and correct me if I'm wrong!) is that handing over a copy of the data does not fall under All Writs. If the map included warrants for iCloud data, etc, I'm pretty sure all 50 states would be colored.
- Bluestrike2 11y agoYou're correct. The All Writs Act is only of use if there are no alternative remedies. The best way to think of the Act is as a catch-all. It gets used when other remedies aren't applicable or don't exist.
- nl 11y agoBoth comments are correct - Apple supplies iCloud data with a warrant[1], but the iPhone access was going to be under the All Writs Act[2]. No judge is going to accept an argument that handing over iCloud data is going to be an unreasonable amount of work to do in response to a warrant - and Apple hasn't even attempted to argue that. [1] http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/05/new-guidelines-outline-what-iphone-data-apple-can-give-to-police/ http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/05/new-guidelines-outline-... [2] http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/how-apple-will-fight-the-doj-in-iphone-backdoor-crypto-case/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/02/how-apple-will-fi...
- shalmanese 11y agoI believe San Bernardino County was the owner of the iPhone so resetting the password would have gone through the standard process of sending a password reset request and then capturing the email at the server. Apple may have assisted in providing the iCloud data in a more digestible form than what's available in the public web interface but that's more a matter of convenience than access.