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As the article mentions, there's no real need for these search powers, when the phone can simply be turned off or physically taken out of range of reception to

by beedogs 12y ago

As the article mentions, there's no real need for these search powers, when the phone can simply be turned off or physically taken out of range of reception to prevent it from being wiped. The feds have yet to prove this is even a real problem.

scintill76 12y ago
What about a "dead-man's switch" that wipes if the authorized user doesn't authenticate every 30 minutes or so? If network connectivity is lost for too long? And turning it off risks losing resident data on the latest activities of the phone, encryption keys in memory, etc. I'm by no means a whole-hearted supporter of DOJ's position on this, but I think their opponents are also exaggerating the availability of other options to collect evidence later.
- YokoZar 12y ago
  That dead man's switch sounds like a great way to wipe your phone every time you take a nap. Regardless, if the hypothetical possiblity that some incredibly uncommon dead man's switch exists is justification for this sort of search, then only allow that sort of search if the police have some sort of reasonable suspicion such a switch exists. It's analogous to how unwarranted home searches are permitted only if an officer reasonably believes there's imminent destruction of evidence - we don't just allow all home searches without warrants because somewhere out there someone might destroy evidence in their house.
  - scintill76 12y ago
    If I were a drug dealer, I think I'd take on pretty onerous risks like that. You could reconfigure the wipe interval and/or drop all sensitive data from RAM and leave it in a safe encrypted state, as the situation requires. You have good points. Both sides seem to be pushing for the extreme permissiveness or restriction in their respective viewpoints, but the best probably lies in between, as you say.
    - chongli 12y ago
      Drug dealers use burners by the bucketload. They have no need for fancy smartphone encryption.
      - scintill76 12y ago
        And when their burner is seized by the police, what protection do they have from all their accomplices being harvested from the contacts list? I guess the numbers can mostly be derived by subpoenaing call records from the phone company, but the names could be useful to police. I guess really smart and serious dealers are going to use cheap burners AND not save numbers, or at least only with useless (to the police) names.
  - x1798DE 12y ago
    Another version of the same thing - encrypt your phone with a large key file stored in memory (like an 8096-bit SSL private key or something). If you don't take some action (logging in, etc) every 30 minutes, the key file is deleted, rendering the data completely inaccessible. You then have the option of keeping a backup version of the key file somewhere separate, where police aren't going to be able to find it or using a dead man's switch which triggers the destruction of the backup key on a longer timescale (1 day, 1 week). Of course, encrypting the phone with a password whenever the screen goes off serves essentially the same purpose, the only difference being that using an auto-shredded key file would likely be slightly more convenient for day-to-day use, and that once the key file is shredded, it's impossible for them to compel the login information from you; the best they can do is get the location of the backup key from you, which can itself be booby-trapped to self-destruct (this has the advantage that it's stored on hardware YOU control, whereas a self-destruct password on the phone itself wouldn't do much if they bother to make a backup image before they start trying to decrypt it).
- verytrivial 12y ago
  That sounds very risky to me. I would prefer a second passcode that when entered quietly destroys the cryptographic key.
  - nnx 12y ago
    One reasonable alternative is to use Apple Configurator and set the number of failed attempts before wipe to much lower than the default 10, say 2 failed attempts only. http://help.apple.com/configurator/mac/1.5/#cadbf9d00f http://help.apple.com/configurator/mac/1.5/#cadbf9d00f

by beedogs 12y ago

scintill76 12y ago

What about a "dead-man's switch" that wipes if the authorized user doesn't authenticate every 30 minutes or so? If network connectivity is lost for too long? And turning it off risks losing resident data on the latest activities of the phone, encryption keys in memory, etc. I'm by no means a whole-hearted supporter of DOJ's position on this, but I think their opponents are also exaggerating the availability of other options to collect evidence later.

YokoZar 12y ago
That dead man's switch sounds like a great way to wipe your phone every time you take a nap. Regardless, if the hypothetical possiblity that some incredibly uncommon dead man's switch exists is justification for this sort of search, then only allow that sort of search if the police have some sort of reasonable suspicion such a switch exists. It's analogous to how unwarranted home searches are permitted only if an officer reasonably believes there's imminent destruction of evidence - we don't just allow all home searches without warrants because somewhere out there someone might destroy evidence in their house.
- scintill76 12y ago
  If I were a drug dealer, I think I'd take on pretty onerous risks like that. You could reconfigure the wipe interval and/or drop all sensitive data from RAM and leave it in a safe encrypted state, as the situation requires. You have good points. Both sides seem to be pushing for the extreme permissiveness or restriction in their respective viewpoints, but the best probably lies in between, as you say.
  - chongli 12y ago
    Drug dealers use burners by the bucketload. They have no need for fancy smartphone encryption.
    - scintill76 12y ago
      And when their burner is seized by the police, what protection do they have from all their accomplices being harvested from the contacts list? I guess the numbers can mostly be derived by subpoenaing call records from the phone company, but the names could be useful to police. I guess really smart and serious dealers are going to use cheap burners AND not save numbers, or at least only with useless (to the police) names.
- x1798DE 12y ago
  Another version of the same thing - encrypt your phone with a large key file stored in memory (like an 8096-bit SSL private key or something). If you don't take some action (logging in, etc) every 30 minutes, the key file is deleted, rendering the data completely inaccessible. You then have the option of keeping a backup version of the key file somewhere separate, where police aren't going to be able to find it or using a dead man's switch which triggers the destruction of the backup key on a longer timescale (1 day, 1 week). Of course, encrypting the phone with a password whenever the screen goes off serves essentially the same purpose, the only difference being that using an auto-shredded key file would likely be slightly more convenient for day-to-day use, and that once the key file is shredded, it's impossible for them to compel the login information from you; the best they can do is get the location of the backup key from you, which can itself be booby-trapped to self-destruct (this has the advantage that it's stored on hardware YOU control, whereas a self-destruct password on the phone itself wouldn't do much if they bother to make a backup image before they start trying to decrypt it).
verytrivial 12y ago
That sounds very risky to me. I would prefer a second passcode that when entered quietly destroys the cryptographic key.
- nnx 12y ago
  One reasonable alternative is to use Apple Configurator and set the number of failed attempts before wipe to much lower than the default 10, say 2 failed attempts only. http://help.apple.com/configurator/mac/1.5/#cadbf9d00f http://help.apple.com/configurator/mac/1.5/#cadbf9d00f