United States President Donald Trump this afternoon weighed in on a disagreement between Apple and the FBI, calling on Apple to "step up to the plate" and "help our great country" by unlocking the iPhones used by Florida shooter Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani.
Trump said that the U.S. is "helping Apple all of the time" but Apple refuses to "unlock" smartphones used by "killers, drug dealers and other violent criminal elements."
The Twitter rant comes following a request yesterday from U.S. Attorney General William Barr, who asked Apple to unlock the iPhone 5 and iPhone 7 used by Alshamrani. Barr complained that Apple had provided "no substantive assistance" and said that it is critical "that the public be able to get access to digital evidence."
Apple previously said that it had provided all of the information in its possession (such as iCloud backups) to the FBI earlier in the month after the FBI asked for assistance obtaining the shooter's data. Law enforcement officials are not satisfied with the iCloud data, however, and want Apple to provide a way to unlock the shooter's iPhones, which is not possible without a backdoor into the software.
After Barr's request, Apple issued another statement and provided further detail on the data that has been provided, as well as once again stating that there is "no such thing as a backdoor just for the good guys." Apple's full response to Barr that ultimately triggered Trump's tweet is below:
The current dispute between Apple and the U.S. government mirrors a similar incident in 2016. Apple was ordered by a federal judge to unlock the iPhone owned by San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook. Apple fought hard against the order, which was asking for backdoor access into iPhones, and explained that weakening security "makes no sense" and would create "new and dangerous weaknesses."
Apple ultimately won the dispute and the government was able to find another way to access Farook's iPhone, which may also be an option in the current situation. Bloomberg this afternoon spoke to several security researchers, including Will Strafach, who said the government could "absolutely" get into the iPhone 5 and iPhone 7 owned by Alshamrani using technology offered by Cellebrite and other iPhone cracking firms.
As in 2016, Apple is not likely to cave in to government demands because doing so would compromise the security of all iPhones. A new report from The New York Times suggests Apple is privately preparing for a legal fight while also attempting to publicly diffuse the situation.
Apple executives are said to be surprised at the case's "quick escalation" and some of the team working on the issue are frustrated that the Justice Department "hasn't spent enough time trying to get into the iPhones with third-party tools." Apple CEO Tim Cook has put together a team handling the dispute, and the group is said to be hoping to steer the situation towards an outside resolution that "doesn't involve the company breaking its own security."
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Article Link: Donald Trump Calls on Apple to 'Step Up to the Plate' and Unlock iPhones Used by Florida Mass Shooter
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