Apple’s conflict with the FBI continues with no end in sight.
Early Monday morning, CEO Tim Cook sent an all-hands memo to Apple employees reassuring the company’s stance on a federal court order that told the company to help the government bypass security functions on an iPhone used by one of the attackers who gunned down 14 people in San Bernardino, California, last December.
The memo was meant to thanks Apple employees for their support and notes an outpouring of public support from “thousands of people in all 50 states” as well. And it goes on to again lay out Apple’s reasons for challenging the court order, before calling on the government to withdraw it entirely.
“We feel the best way forward would be for the government to withdraw its demands under the All Writs Act and, as some in Congress have proposed, form a commission or other panel of experts on intelligence, technology and civil liberties to discuss the implications for law enforcement, national security, privacy and personal freedoms,” Cook writes.
“This case is about much more than a single phone or a single investigation,” Cook writes. “At stake is the data security of hundreds of millions of law-abiding people, and setting a dangerous precedent that threatens everyone’s civil liberties.”
Cook’s letter serves as a preface to a public Q&A for Apple customers meant to answer questions about the facts of the case, its stakes, and Apple’s position. It also works to rebut arguments recently put forth by the FBI, which over the weekend argued that what it is asking Apple to do isn’t that big a deal.
“We don’t want to break anyone’s encryption or set a master key loose on the land,” FBI Director James Comey wrote in a blog post Sunday night, adding that crucial decisions about public safety and privacy shouldn’t be left to “corporations that sell stuff for a living.”
Apple’s Q&A asserts that while the FBI might claim to not want a master key to the iPhone, that is exactly what it would get. “In the physical world, it would be the equivalent of a master key, capable of opening hundreds of millions of locks,” the company explains.
“Of course Apple would do our best to protect that key, but in a world where all of our data is under constant threat, it would be relentlessly attacked by hackers and cybercriminals. As recent attacks on the IRS systems and countless other data breaches have shown, no one is immune to cyber-attacks.”
“We have done everything that’s both within our power and within the law to help in this case,” Apple explains in its Q&A. “As the government has confirmed, we’ve handed over all the data we have, including a backup of the iPhone in question. But now they have asked us for information we simply do not have.”
