Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 376 posts

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#31

Post by smitherfield »

kabdib wrote: post #13
smitherfield wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At-will employment does not extend to firing people in order to not comply with a court order.

HR to security engineer: "You're quitting? That's a shame. Um . . . Tim Cook has a beach house he wouldn't mind you using for a while. Can you walk his dog?" My point is, the individuals won't suffer.

When you get a lawful court order, you comply with it. To do otherwise would result in massive fines and quite possibly executives being criminally charged. If the Apple security engineers want to quit on principle, then it truly would be on principle; there is absolutely no way Apple's legal department would allow them to ever be rehired or offered any compensation/gifts beyond a standard severance package. If engineers did quit, Apple would be forced to (at great expense) temporarily hire other people with comparable expertise in order to comply with the order.

That said, Apple security engineers probably would land on their feet.

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#32

Post by caf »

kstenerud wrote: post #26

Taking this further down the rabbit hole: Suppose that only about 5 people can do what the FBI wants done. Suppose all 5 refuse, to the point of quitting Apple. Does the FBI now compel them to return to Apple and write the software or go to jail? And what if one of those engineers says that he doesn't actually know how to do it; Apple only thought he could, but he actually can't. Now we get into territory of proving…

Well, if you can draft people to go over to Vietnam and be shot at by the NVA...

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#33

Post by stcredzero »

yarou wrote: post #20

This is very much a case of civil disobedience. Non-violent struggle is a surprisingly effective tactic. As Gandhi states: >You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind.

>You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind.

He said that in the 20th century. Imprisoning the mind is the province of the 21st century. Both governments and pseudo-"activists" now seek to do this by leveraging the Internet.

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#34

Post by LAMike »

jfoutz wrote: post #19
moioci wrote: post #2

Interesting parallel with Lavabit pointed out at the end of the article. Would the DOJ be willing to risk shutting down the biggest and most profitable corporation on earth over this?

The DOJ couldn't shut down apple. Apple has $200,000,000,000 in cash and marketable securities. DOJ's budget is only 27 billion. That's a lot of lawyer time. It's a huge waste of money, but there it is. Way less likely, but Apple could move HQ to another country. And take their secret source code and keys with them.

The US government would respond by banning all iOS devices

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#35

Post by JimDabell »

iamleppert wrote: post #24

I bet none of these engineers have spent a single night in jail. All it would take would be for a judge to send a single one to jail for the weekend, and they'd be happy to quickly bang out whatever the government wanted as soon as possible on Monday morning. The sentiment is nice, but I doubt the government is worried in the slightest. The government is all powerful and can be whatever it wants, lest we forget.

> All it would take would be for a judge to send a single one to jail for the weekend

On what grounds? None of them have broken the law and the order, should it come about, would be for Apple to perform this work, not specific employees (or, if they resign, ex-employees). What would be the route for the government to compel specific individuals – who do not own or control Apple's code or data, and individually are not the only people who can perform this work – to do this?

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#36

Post by rawnlq »

jfoutz wrote: post #19
moioci wrote: post #2

Interesting parallel with Lavabit pointed out at the end of the article. Would the DOJ be willing to risk shutting down the biggest and most profitable corporation on earth over this?

The DOJ couldn't shut down apple. Apple has $200,000,000,000 in cash and marketable securities. DOJ's budget is only 27 billion. That's a lot of lawyer time. It's a huge waste of money, but there it is. Way less likely, but Apple could move HQ to another country. And take their secret source code and keys with them.

I wonder if there's any advantage for Apple to form their own sovereign nation to operate out of. They are already richer than many existing countries. Can't they just buy out a Singapore-sized island somewhere?

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#37

Post by cortesoft »

kstenerud wrote: post #26

Taking this further down the rabbit hole: Suppose that only about 5 people can do what the FBI wants done. Suppose all 5 refuse, to the point of quitting Apple. Does the FBI now compel them to return to Apple and write the software or go to jail? And what if one of those engineers says that he doesn't actually know how to do it; Apple only thought he could, but he actually can't. Now we get into territory of proving…

Or, lets say they complete the task... and it doesn't work. Then what?

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#38

Post by Tloewald »

caf wrote: post #32
kstenerud wrote: post #26

Taking this further down the rabbit hole: Suppose that only about 5 people can do what the FBI wants done. Suppose all 5 refuse, to the point of quitting Apple. Does the FBI now compel them to return to Apple and write the software or go to jail? And what if one of those engineers says that he doesn't actually know how to do it; Apple only thought he could, but he actually can't. Now we get into territory of proving…

Well, if you can draft people to go over to Vietnam and be shot at by the NVA...

But that wasn't relying on the All Writs Act. I.e. "because the court wants you to do X and there's no specific rule that says whether you can force someone to do X"

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#39

Post by harryh »

kstenerud wrote: post #26

Taking this further down the rabbit hole: Suppose that only about 5 people can do what the FBI wants done. Suppose all 5 refuse, to the point of quitting Apple. Does the FBI now compel them to return to Apple and write the software or go to jail? And what if one of those engineers says that he doesn't actually know how to do it; Apple only thought he could, but he actually can't. Now we get into territory of proving…

There are a lot more than 5 people who can do what the FBI wants done. Your hypothetical doesn't really seem all that relevant.

Re: Apple Encryption Engineers, If Ordered to Unlock iPhone, Might Resist

#40

Post by joesmo »

kstenerud wrote: post #26

Taking this further down the rabbit hole: Suppose that only about 5 people can do what the FBI wants done. Suppose all 5 refuse, to the point of quitting Apple. Does the FBI now compel them to return to Apple and write the software or go to jail? And what if one of those engineers says that he doesn't actually know how to do it; Apple only thought he could, but he actually can't. Now we get into territory of proving…

If a password is considered testimony and protected by the 5th Amendment, software also appears to be testimony and covered by the same. If not, then software is just speech and protected by the 1st Amendment. Not speaking is then a valid choice seeing as to how this is not testimony and one is not compelled to speak by the court. But this is just theoretical...
Post reply on HN