GOP Presidential Contenders Urge Apple To Comply With FBI Order
A trio of GOP presidential hopefuls called on Apple to comply with U.S. District Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym’s court order in Riverside, California, requiring the company to create software to bypass the auto-erase function on an iPhone 5c used by one of the two alleged attackers involved in the Dec. 2 terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California.
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Apple asked Pym Thursday to throw out her order granting the motion filed by the Department of Justice and FBI to compel Apple to create the software that would unlock the iPhone 5c used by San Bernardino attacker Syed Rizwan Farook. Apple’s formal motion came after CEO Tim Cook said the company wouldn’t comply with Pym’s order (see 1602170068 and 1602250056). Apple’s clash with the FBI was also the center of debate on an episode of C-SPAN’s The Communicators posted online Friday.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said during Thursday night's GOP presidential debate that Apple “absolutely” should comply with Pym’s order, noting that it would disable only the iPhone 5c’s auto-erase function, which deletes the device’s contents after a specific number of failed login attempts. “If that’s all they’re asking for, they’re not asking for Apple to create a back door to encryption,” Rubio said. He previously had defended Apple’s stance but noted Thursday that the company’s earlier characterization of the FBI’s request was “not accurate.” Rubio “was on both sides of the fence,” said Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in his own comments during the debate urging Apple to comply with the court order. “He’s now agreeing with me, and so I’m glad.” GOP hopeful Ben Carson also repeated his earlier insistence that Apple comply with the court order.
The Center for Democracy and Technology doesn’t “want to see Apple forced to build malware,” effectively “doing a cybercriminal’s job for them,” said Vice President-Policy Chris Calabrese during The Communicators. “That’s a terrible outcome that’s likely to make all of us less safe.” The FBI Agents Association “would like to see Apple stop selling malware in the form of” encryption software “that’s being marketed based on the false promise of security,” said General Counsel Josh Zive. Apple and other tech companies have hyped their use of encryption for purely commercial reasons, and the proliferation of encrypted software on their devices is now “a real threat to the fulcrum that the balance of privacy and security sits on,” Zive said.
Zive argued that Apple’s protestations against Pym’s order are filled with hyperbole, noting that the order is simply “the normal operation of the Fourth Amendment” as applied for centuries. “These devices have been intentionally designed to be impenetrable” by law enforcement, he said. “That’s not the way our system is designed to operate.” Although Pym’s order wouldn’t directly break the iPhone 5c’s encryption, it would break the security of the phone, Calabrese said: “If we set this precedent now, were going to be setting a precedent” that would allow the government to force tech companies “to turn the devices that we rely on into spies on us.”