FBI: It's 'Simply Too Early' to Tell if Info on San Bernardino Shooter's iPhone is Valuable

[MacRumors]

The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation is still working on analyzing the information found on the iPhone of San Bernardino Shooter Syed Farook, reports The Wall Street Journal. FBI general counsel James Baker shared news on the iPhone earlier today at the International Association of Privacy Professionals conference, where he said it's too early to tell if the data on the device is useful.

"We're now doing an analysis of that data, as we would in any other type of criminal terrorism investigation,'' Mr. Baker said, adding: "That means we would follow logical leads." But because the agency has only had access to the data for a short period of time, he said "it's simply too early'' to say whether anything found on the phone has been valuable to investigators.

After a very public legal battle in which the FBI obtained a court order demanding Apple help the government unlock the iPhone used by Farook in a December shooting in San Bernardino, the Justice Department last week announced it had found an alternate method to gain access to the iPhone in question and dropped the lawsuit.

While the FBI has not shared how it was able to unlock the iPhone, nor shared details on what was found, it is believed Israeli mobile software developer Cellebrite, a company that offers "mobile forensic solutions," was enlisted to break into the device.

According to Baker, the FBI has not decided whether or not it will divulge details on what was found on the iPhone and will not make a decision on whether to do so until the full analysis is complete on both the device and the cracking tool used to unlock it.

It remains unclear if the hacking method used to break into the iPhone is only viable for the iPhone 5c used by Farook, but in a previous piece, The Wall Street Journal said the FBI is testing to see if it can be used to unlock other versions of the iPhone.

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Article Link: FBI: It's 'Simply Too Early' to Tell if Info on San Bernardino Shooter's iPhone is Valuable

 

[ProjectManager101]

Any jealousy girl can figure out the "data" of her boyfriend's iPhone in a few seconds.

 

[Z400Racer37]

So no.. After all that..

 

[keysofanxiety]

In other words: "We found nothing, we knew we'd find nothing, and we just wanted to use the threat of terrorism to set a precedent where we could legally hack any device we wanted. Unfortunately for us, the public weren't as stupid as we thought, and wouldn't go along with it."

 

[DaveN]

'Still too early' after all this time is code for 'We haven't found anything remotely useful. We hope people forget about this before we announce that nothing useful was on the phone.'

 

[ChristianVirtual]

...

While the FBI has not shared how it was unable to unlock the iPhone,

I think they shared enough how they are unable to unlock ... Typo I guess ?

 

[GadgetDon]

Am I the only one who finds it odd that the FBI would be talking about this case at a meeting of the International Association of Privacy Professionals? I'd love to know the context, since this issue was about concerns over privacy and so it seems unlikely the FBI would want to raise this issue in front of that audience.

 

[jclo]

I think they shared enough how they are unable to unlock ... Typo I guess ?

Yep, thanks. Fixing.

 

[iLoveiTunes]

I am sure officer Wiggum P.I. works for FBI

 

[writingdevil]

'Still too early' after all this time is code for 'We haven't found anything remotely useful. We hope people forget about this before we announce that nothing useful was on the phone.'

Any security op anywhere in the world would NEVER reveal what they found on a hacked device. That's really spycraft 101. That's why hundreds of thousands of docs are buried for decades, granted some likely somebody's gramma's recipe for cakes.

 

[69650]

Somehow I don't think the Feds will be knocking on Apple's door next time, if they already know how to hack the iPhone.

 

[ProjectManager101]

Any jealousy girl can figure out the "data" of her boyfriend's iPhone in a few seconds.

It is true! just take any of the girls at the FBI, an intern (if she is latina better). And tell her "we have the iPhone of your boyfriend and we believe he is cheating on you". And you will see how she unlocks the thing in 5 minutes and pull everything and tell you everything she has found.

 

[currocj]

So no.. After all that..

Right, because he lists his contacts such as: Jimmy "the guy who helps me practice shooting infidels". Either you are insinuating it take zero time to investigate everyone and FBI work is a piece of cake and/or the FBI should have blurt out: we found 5 more Islamic-terrorists on his phone, the raid is next Tuesday!

Of course they are going to keep everything they find secret until it's useless or leaked.

 

[azentropy]

I'll be very surprised if they find anything. They tried to destroyed other phones, hard drives etc., why didn't they destroy this one? Because it doesn't contain anything.

 

[swingerofbirch]

Is anyone able to say that company's name out loud without it sounding like you're saying "celebrate" in an Australian accent?

I've tried numerous times. Each time I sound like an Aussie. Trippy!

 

[pat500000]

Are you sure you actually hacked into that phone? OR...did you think you think that twitter bug was going to save your organization?

 

[duffman9000]

Methinks they are trying to make something up right now. Nothing found yet...

 

[miniyou64]

No its not too early, it was a work phone and there's nothing on it

 

[pubwvj]

In translation: the information on the iPhone was useless but we don't want to admit we wasted millions of taxpayer dollars on this or that we were wrong.

 

[drumcat]

So, the FIB perjured themselves saying they had no recourse... are they facing charges now?

 

[Benjamin Frost]

I trust the FBI as much as I trust Tim Cook. They both have sinister agendas.

 

[Pike R. Alpha]

I trust the FBI as much as I trust Tim Cook. They both have sinister agendas.

With one major difference. The FBI is fighting terrorism, but Tim Cook's Co (Apple) ideas about 'protecting your privacy' may actually help terrorists to hide their trails. This is also why I believe that trusting Apple is a bad idea.

 

[einsteinbqat]

It just means that the FBI absolutely found ****-all on the device. They would be boasting about it had they found anything. And that is of course if they managed to unlock the iPhone in the first place!

 

[SirCheese]

They would be boasting about it had they found anything.

No, they would not.

 

[miniyou64]

With one major difference. The FBI is fighting terrorism, but Tim Cook's Co (Apple) ideas about 'protecting your privacy' may actually help terrorists to hide their trails. This is also why I believe that trusting Apple is a bad idea.

The FBI wants to control people and lock them up, Apple just wants my money. I'll take the latter.