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FBI Complains About Encryption Making It Difficult to Scrape Dead Person's Phone

60 points by hn_acker 2y ago

hn_acker 2y ago
The full title is: > FBI Back To Complaining About Encryption Making It Difficult To Scrape All Data From A Dead Person’s Phone
- mewpmewp2 2y ago
  This sounds like a title from the Onion.
hn_acker 2y ago
An excerpt I found insightful from a comment [1] on the original page: > Complaining that they can’t access everything, all the time on electronic devices/services is no different than whining that people are able to speak without being recorded and that means that criminal communications might not be available for law enforcement to access. [1] https://www.techdirt.com/2024/07/31/fbi-back-to-complaining-about-encryption-making-it-difficult-to-scrape-all-data-from-a-dead-persons-phone/#comment-3953626 https://www.techdirt.com/2024/07/31/fbi-back-to-complaining-...
mikece 2y ago
And if they got their way Federal Law Enforcement would abolish the 4th and 5th Amendments and record everyone, everywhere, all the time. Because it's easier than doing actual investigation and police work.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- mrguyorama 2y ago
  And they STILL clear an abysmally low percent of crimes, despite the 4th being de facto ignored for decades
MissTake 2y ago
Think the word I’m thinking of is “Good”.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
chatmasta 2y ago
Law enforcement was in an adjacent building 20 feet from the shooter and they couldn’t stop him. I’m not sure that breaking encryption will help them do their job.
- create-account 2y ago
  They were waiting to retrieve the phone
  - willcipriano 2y ago
    This was complicated by how steep the roof was.
    - egberts1 2y ago
      Despite the shooter leaving a ladder behind.
mjfl 2y ago
It's always interesting seeing these headlines because you always have to assume that Apple has been coerced by the govt into putting a backdoor into the phones, but maybe not. If I remember correctly, the FBI got an Israeli company to break into the phone, and they succeeded with ease. Maybe it's not the US government that got the backdoor, but another...
- stuffoverflow 2y ago
  My understanding is that at least in recent years Cellebrite has not had any 100% reliable way to crack a phone. But because people typically use short, numbers only passwords it is enough to be able to bypass the rate limiting to brute force all possible combinations.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 2y ago
  To put on my tin hat for a moment. Even if the government had a bullet proof way to crack phone encryption, I would expect that to be a closely guarded secret. Best make a bunch of noise huffing and puffing how you are stymied and cannot see the data. That being said, even if they had the tools, might be something kept in reserve for the most dire of cases, rather than tip your hand and let Apple/Google discover the trick on a minor case.
  - 15155 2y ago
    This isn't even a tin foil hat requiring thing: this is exactly what happened with the 2015 San Bernardino iPhone case. FBI wanted to compel Apple to release custom, new software to bypass rate limiting on an older device, Apple said "no," and when the case started turn against them, Cellebrite magically "found" the passcode and mooted the case. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple%E2%80%93FBI_encryption_dispute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple%E2%80%93FBI_encryption_d... FBI made this attempt to establish precedent.
Am4TIfIsER0ppos 2y ago
Of course they can read it. They just don't want to. More evidence of law enforcement incompetence or collaboration might leak.
- alan-hn 2y ago
  From what I'm aware they can get the key by physically milling a chip on the board to get access to memory, but they take evey opportunity to complain so that companies might be forced to install backdoors
  - Log_out_ 2y ago
    Right aft3r crowdstrike showed the world the results of a hollowed out security. The true hostile actors were the paranoid inside the house.
usernamed7 2y ago
It's supposed to be difficult. That's a feature. Trump wants to abolish the FBI and they're out complaining they can't easily break into everyone's phones. Maybe they should cool it with the police state shtick.

60 points by hn_acker 2y ago

The full title is: > FBI Back To Complaining About Encryption Making It Difficult To Scrape All Data From A Dead Person’s Phone

mewpmewp2 2y ago
This sounds like a title from the Onion.

hn_acker 2y ago

An excerpt I found insightful from a comment [1] on the original page: > Complaining that they can’t access everything, all the time on electronic devices/services is no different than whining that people are able to speak without being recorded and that means that criminal communications might not be available for law enforcement to access. [1] https://www.techdirt.com/2024/07/31/fbi-back-to-complaining-about-encryption-making-it-difficult-to-scrape-all-data-from-a-dead-persons-phone/#comment-3953626 https://www.techdirt.com/2024/07/31/fbi-back-to-complaining-...

mikece 2y ago

And if they got their way Federal Law Enforcement would abolish the 4th and 5th Amendments and record everyone, everywhere, all the time. Because it's easier than doing actual investigation and police work.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
mrguyorama 2y ago
And they STILL clear an abysmally low percent of crimes, despite the 4th being de facto ignored for decades

MissTake 2y ago

Think the word I’m thinking of is “Good”.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

chatmasta 2y ago

Law enforcement was in an adjacent building 20 feet from the shooter and they couldn’t stop him. I’m not sure that breaking encryption will help them do their job.

create-account 2y ago
They were waiting to retrieve the phone
- willcipriano 2y ago
  This was complicated by how steep the roof was.
  - egberts1 2y ago
    Despite the shooter leaving a ladder behind.

mjfl 2y ago

It's always interesting seeing these headlines because you always have to assume that Apple has been coerced by the govt into putting a backdoor into the phones, but maybe not. If I remember correctly, the FBI got an Israeli company to break into the phone, and they succeeded with ease. Maybe it's not the US government that got the backdoor, but another...

stuffoverflow 2y ago
My understanding is that at least in recent years Cellebrite has not had any 100% reliable way to crack a phone. But because people typically use short, numbers only passwords it is enough to be able to bypass the rate limiting to brute force all possible combinations.
0cf8612b2e1e 2y ago
To put on my tin hat for a moment. Even if the government had a bullet proof way to crack phone encryption, I would expect that to be a closely guarded secret. Best make a bunch of noise huffing and puffing how you are stymied and cannot see the data. That being said, even if they had the tools, might be something kept in reserve for the most dire of cases, rather than tip your hand and let Apple/Google discover the trick on a minor case.
- 15155 2y ago
  This isn't even a tin foil hat requiring thing: this is exactly what happened with the 2015 San Bernardino iPhone case. FBI wanted to compel Apple to release custom, new software to bypass rate limiting on an older device, Apple said "no," and when the case started turn against them, Cellebrite magically "found" the passcode and mooted the case. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple%E2%80%93FBI_encryption_dispute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple%E2%80%93FBI_encryption_d... FBI made this attempt to establish precedent.

Am4TIfIsER0ppos 2y ago

Of course they can read it. They just don't want to. More evidence of law enforcement incompetence or collaboration might leak.

alan-hn 2y ago
From what I'm aware they can get the key by physically milling a chip on the board to get access to memory, but they take evey opportunity to complain so that companies might be forced to install backdoors
- Log_out_ 2y ago
  Right aft3r crowdstrike showed the world the results of a hollowed out security. The true hostile actors were the paranoid inside the house.

usernamed7 2y ago

It's supposed to be difficult. That's a feature. Trump wants to abolish the FBI and they're out complaining they can't easily break into everyone's phones. Maybe they should cool it with the police state shtick.