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Apple will no longer unlock most iPhones, iPads for police
- declan 12y agoDiscussion thread for the actual Apple policy is here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8333595 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8333595
- xnull2guest 12y agoWe're seeing quite a lot of these sorts of headlines across different companies. It's important to keep in mind that: - It was not necessary for Apple to unlock devices for the NSA. - Police use Stingray devices and taps at phone towers to track you based on your location, which is out of Apple's jurisdiction. - Backdoor-equivalent features that are running on all modern iOS devices which do not require Apple specialists to activate were found and were disclosed at Blackhat this year. - Police have access to forensic kits that give them access to devices without working with manufacturers. - Backdoors are created in commercial products through ABBA, ORCHESTRA, and other programs and so often are not known by the company. - Other tech companies have a history of misleading their customers about the access police and government have to their products (Skype, Blackberry, Microsoft OneDrive/Sharepoint). - There is legal precedent which forces you to unlock your devices and hand over encryption keys in the case of an investigation. - Physical access (think geohot's original iPhone root) always means device ownership. Always. - Much of the data on your iDevice is automatically synced to the cloud (think recent celebrity nude leaks). Your device often does not need to be unlocked in this case.