Apple chief Tim Cook went public Wednesday in his battle with the Federal Bureau of Investigation FBI saying that unlocking an iPhone in the name of fighting terrorism would be bad for America. He equated code capable of breaking into an iPhone to a software equivalent of cancer, that should never be unleashed on the world. This is not about this phone Cook said during a television interview with ABC News.This is about the future. It is a precedent that should not be done in this country, or in any country.
Apple is battling the United States government over unlocking devices
in at least 10 cases in addition to its high-profile dispute involving the
iPhone of one of the San Bernardino attackers, court documents show. Cook maintained that the definite dangers of
creating a way to crack into iPhone encryption trumped concerns about "something
that might be there adding he felt Apple was making the right choice. Apple is
being asked to write software that the company believes would make hundreds of
millions of iPhones around the world vulnerable, according to Cook.
The only
way Apple knows to get more information from Farook's iPhone would be to
"write a piece of software that we view as the software equivalent of
cancer. He argued that the FBI demand threatens to trample on civil liberties
and starts down a slippery slope that could lead to other court orders such as
building police surveillance capabilities into devices. It is clear that it can
be a precedent, Cook said. If the government can order Apple to create such a
piece of software, it could be ordered for anyone else as well. Cook planned to
discuss the case with US President Barack Obama, and said his company was
prepared to take the matter all the way to the Supreme Court.
We aren't
protecting their privacy; we are protecting the privacy of everyone else. A
physical key you could shred. A software key would stay living. He called for
the case to be withdraw on the grounds that it is bad for America. Cook called
for the clash to be settled by Congress passing law that clearly defines what
private companies are required to do in such cases.Apple engineers are already
working to raise iPhone defences to a level they could not be breached in the
way the government is demanding in the San Bernardino case, the New York Times
reported on Wednesday, citing sources close to the company and security
experts.
Google chief Sundar Pichai on Wednesday added his voice to the ranks
of Silicon Valley tech firms siding with Apple. When you create back doors it
leads to very, very bad consequences which always ends up harming users,chief
executive Pichai said during a conference at Paris's Sciences Po university, as
he waded into the controversy.
Meanwhile, America's top spy said in a National Public Radio interview on Wednesday that he supports the FBI's side in the high-profile battle with Apple. Central Intelligence Agency Director John Brennan said the public would never accept criminals or terrorists having exclusive access to a physical storage box, and asked why an encrypted phone should be treated any differently.
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