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

Apple’s dangerous game

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 113 posts

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#91

Post by snowwrestler »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #75
snowwrestler wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Orin's point is not that everything should have a backdoor (which would not comport with his many previous writings on tech and law), but that Apple's shift, and in particular the public way in which it has been done, could trigger unintended consequences from the courts or Congress. Hence the "dangerous game" title.

Is Congress now going to legislate away the fourth amendment?

The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, not all searches and seizures. Given a warrant is properly issued, a court can hold a person in contempt if they refuse to provide the documents listed in the warrant. So the question is, what is the punishment for contempt? Congress can legislate that for specific situations.

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#92

Post by [deleted] »

RickHull wrote: post #88
snowwrestler wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Orin Kerr is definitely a lawyer, and has been working and writing on digital crime and civil rights for years. For example, he was part of the defense team during weev's appeal of his conviction. I do think he thinks beyond the technicalities of the law. And I think he's correct that there are legitimate reasons to pierce device encryption. If a victim is murdered, and their phone is locked, it sure would be nice to…

I completely agree with your assessment of Kerr, and there is nothing wrong with purely legal analysis. What got to me initially was the deliberate limiting of legal scope to warranted privacy violations, as though warrantless privacy violations are insignificant. He's welcome to do so, but he should be clearer about this and less rhetorically dedicated to his agenda. EDIT: I see now that he reasons this technology o…

[deleted]

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#93

Post by eevilspock »

RickHull wrote: post #31

Orin Kerr is clearly a lawyer. He argues not for what is right but for what is permissible given the existing body of law. Where the existing body of law is wrong, his writings have no sympathy for the damage inflicted on its victims nor any sense that resisting such wrongs is noble. If the government never abused its authority, I would be much more sympathetic to Kerr's position. Given the facts of prosecutorial abu…

"Get real Orin - the government can serve the warrant the old fashioned (constitutional) way: on the intended target," wrote one of the commenters on the article itself.

Gag orders served on service providers such as Apple preventing people from knowing the government is looking at their data a effectively made irrelevant. This is a big deal, whether or not the Fifth Amendment allows people to ultimately deny the government access.

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#94

Post by skriticos2 »

It's clear by reading the article that this is a purely one-sided legal assessment of the issue.

Putting on Apples shoes I think this decision was more guided by financial, risk and PR motivations.

Apple is a mass technology company focused on synergies. Dealing with red tape and custom data decryption is definitely outside that area. It adds additional cost, not just for the work performed, but also organisational overhead (they probably have to hire people for this, open new organisational units or divert existing resources from more useful work). I'm sure that can't be simply expressed in numbers and much less covered by the government, even if they pay for the services.

There is the risk which has a technical nature: if a black hat / leak (e.g. disgruntled employee) / someone outside the organisation ever acquires the means to unlock costumer phones outside the confines of Apple, all hell would break loose. And while I'm sure they make proper precautions, not having to deal with this as a risk is likely more desirable.

The PR side is the most obvious one: there are lot's of people that are not comfortable that Apple can simply unlock their data and will buy something else just because they are not so forthcoming with the court warrants. More importantly, businesses will have a very hand time to justify the risk of information leakage because they use a product that has outside access vectors.

So this decision seems to make perfect sense to me from a business perspective: less cost + operational overhead, less risk of something going horribly wrong and better PR light. What's not to love about it?

Note: IANAL, I don't own any Apple devices and I'm not a U.S. citizen nor do I live in the U.S.

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#95

Post by CRASCH »

A back door is a vulnerability regardless of its intended use. There is no way to assure it can't be used elsewhere. I would be shocked if the existing decryption method used internally at Apple wasn't fully available to other agencies. How hard would it be for a three letter agency to get someone in the right position to obtain the keys and tools?

The closing of this vulnerability makes business sense for Apple. Considering how connected these devices are only, marooned data would not already be available elsewhere. Perhaps a photo that wasn't uploaded or a note taken. Everything else is accessible. Location data is available via cell tower logs. Voice calls, call history, SMS, email, web history, etc... all available already...

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#96

Post by [deleted] »

eevilspock wrote: post #93
RickHull wrote: post #31

Orin Kerr is clearly a lawyer. He argues not for what is right but for what is permissible given the existing body of law. Where the existing body of law is wrong, his writings have no sympathy for the damage inflicted on its victims nor any sense that resisting such wrongs is noble. If the government never abused its authority, I would be much more sympathetic to Kerr's position. Given the facts of prosecutorial abu…

"Get real Orin - the government can serve the warrant the old fashioned (constitutional) way: on the intended target," wrote one of the commenters on the article itself. Gag orders served on service providers such as Apple preventing people from knowing the government is looking at their data a effectively made irrelevant. This is a big deal, whether or not the Fifth Amendment allows people to ultimately deny the gov…

[deleted]

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#97

Post by nl »

golemotron wrote: post #51
nl wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The arguments in this article are hinged on one crucial premise: Apple stills owns your device even after selling it to you. Hu? That idea isn't even mentioned in the article, and it seems entirely irrelevant. The analogy to this premise is that the producers of a safe that they sell to you must be able to provide the government a key to the safe. This clearly does not make sense.. It may not make sense to you, but k…

The point is that when someone sells you a thing, they should no longer be responsible to someone else for it. You should be responsible. It is now your thing.

Oh, I see what you are saying. That's an argument that isn't supported in the physical world, and one that isn't made in the article.

In this case it is more similar to car manufacturer being asked under warrant to produce a new electronic key for a car.

They have specialized skills and tools that allow them to do that, as did Apple prior to iOS 8.

No one is making the argument that Apple retain ownership of the device.

(To be clear - I think Apple is doing the right thing here. But there is no point in trying to confuse the issue with inaccurate arguments)

Re: Apple’s dangerous game

#98

Post by glenra »

snowwrestler wrote: post #73
RickHull wrote: post #31

Orin Kerr is clearly a lawyer. He argues not for what is right but for what is permissible given the existing body of law. Where the existing body of law is wrong, his writings have no sympathy for the damage inflicted on its victims nor any sense that resisting such wrongs is noble. If the government never abused its authority, I would be much more sympathetic to Kerr's position. Given the facts of prosecutorial abu…

Orin Kerr is definitely a lawyer, and has been working and writing on digital crime and civil rights for years. For example, he was part of the defense team during weev's appeal of his conviction. I do think he thinks beyond the technicalities of the law. And I think he's correct that there are legitimate reasons to pierce device encryption. If a victim is murdered, and their phone is locked, it sure would be nice to…

Right. The claim "The policy switch doesn’t stop hackers, trespassers, or rogue agents. It only stops lawful investigations with lawful warrants." is invalid because "hackers, trespassers, or rogue agents" might either get warrants or plausibly claim to have warrants. Indeed, the chief problem Apple is trying to address is that everybody suspects the NSA has been engaging in massive secret fishing expeditions. Warrants are too easy to obtain. Law officers might easily BE the bad guy or WORKING FOR a bad guy, in which case denying them access provides a social good. In the current context (the era of "parallel construction" and gag orders), the fact that a judge rubber-stamped a warrant does not provide much evidence that social good is met by serving that warrant. If cops have to work a little harder to get their job done, on balance that's probably a good thing.
Post reply on HN