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

nytimes.com

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

#111

Post by daurnimator »

melvinmt wrote: post #101
studentrob wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They could be fined hundreds of thousands daily for refusing to act. We recently found out this happened to Yahoo in 2008 [1] via the FISA court. Apple shareholders wouldn't like that. I'm pretty sure Tim Cook and his lawyer mean it when they say they will comply with the law. Apple engineers need not worry so much about quitting their jobs over this. If I were there I would stick with Tim Cook. Consider, If Apple lo…

> They could be fined hundreds of thousands daily for refusing to act. Apple's revenue is $658 million per day (2015), not sure if they care too much about "hundreds of thousands".

revenue != profits.

Will people please stop quoting revenue figures for things like this.

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

#112

Post by harryh »

hysan wrote: post #107
harryh wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then they explain why it doesn't work to a judge and the judge decides if it doesn't work for a good reason or if it doesn't work because someone intentionally screwed it up. If it was for a good reason then welp. Sometimes shit doesn't work. Oh well. If they intentionally screwed it up then they could be found in contempt of court and fined and/or jailed. In either case the would be asked to try again if that was fe…

But how would a judge have the technical know-how to make that determination? If the answer is to have security experts listen in an make the call, would that even be legal since one of the requirements is to allow Apple to keep this in-house for fear of leaking said code? One last final question, if they do force the engineers to come in and explain themselves over and over to the government's satisfaction, that wil…

Our legal system is asked to make findings of fact all the time on technical matters. This would be just like any of the rest of those. Witnesses could be questioned. Expert testimony could be delivered. Etc.

I understand that it's a common viewpoint on HN that the courts are ill equipped to make these determinations. Personally I think that viewpoint is vastly overstated, but that's a debate for another day.

As to your question about "unreasonable burden", Apple made something like 50 billion dollars in profit last year. The burden is going to have to get pretty high before it starts to get unreasonable. A couple of hours (or dozens of hours, or hundreds of hours) isn't going to even begin to get there.

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

#113

Post by studentrob »

saulrh wrote: post #99
studentrob wrote: post #74

I honestly feel that engineers need not fall on their swords over this. The decision is up to them, of course. But ultimately, shareholders would expect someone to comply with the court order should the DOJ win. Note that Yahoo was threatened with daily fines of $250,000 for failing to comply in a FISA court case in 2008, and we only just learned this in 2014 [1]. I don't think we would live in a forced back door wor…

> I don't think we would live in a forced back door world for too long. After another 2, 4, or 8 years, we will eventually realize that giving the government a back door to the iPhone did not give it a back door to the myriad of other encrypted communications tools out there. Terrorists will find other ways to hide their communications. I'm going to disagree with you here. Didn't we think, back in 2001, that we'd onl…

You make great points. I'm not 100% sure about what will happen if Apple loses this case, or if Congress manages to pass anti-encryption laws in 2016.

All the more reason to educate the public now about how encryption works.

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

#114

Post by beachy »

studentrob wrote: post #74

I honestly feel that engineers need not fall on their swords over this. The decision is up to them, of course. But ultimately, shareholders would expect someone to comply with the court order should the DOJ win. Note that Yahoo was threatened with daily fines of $250,000 for failing to comply in a FISA court case in 2008, and we only just learned this in 2014 [1]. I don't think we would live in a forced back door wor…

Indeed.

Let's say Apple is forced to bake a back door into their devices.

Criminals and people who care about privacy will use their own encryption tech (they probably do anyway) and life goes on for them.

Eventually the govt's backdoor is abused or cracked. The people grow fretful. A truly secure device from somewhere outside the US gains market traction. The US tech industry's shrieks gather volume.

The govt realises the game is up and allows Apple devices to be secured again.

This issue is not one that demands that anyone fall on their sword. Even if the govt gets its way, no-one will be killed or even harmed. Eventually the natural order of things will be restored.

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

#115

Post by ohyeshedid »

studentrob wrote: post #108
jnbiche wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think we would live in a forced back door world for too long. After another 2, 4, or 8 years, we will eventually realize that giving the government a back door to the iPhone did not give it a back door to the myriad of other encrypted communications tools out there. Terrorists will find other ways to hide their communications. So you really think the government will have gathered all that power, only to rea…

Well, eventually people will realize they can just download an encrypted communications tool right? I'm not 100% sure about what happens after 2/4/8 years. That scenario also relies on a really informed public to fight back and care. This is why I and a few other engineers are forming a grassroots campaign to support encryption. If you'd like to get involved, send me an email at stillastudent on google's email servic…

Sure, they can, but this entire case is about precedent. If Apple can't win this kind of fight, what do you think will happen to the developers of those encrypted communications tools; or encryption products across the board.

Remember Truecrypt, Hushmail, Lavabit, etc? Too small to fight back.

That's why so much rests in the outcome of the fight with Apple.

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

#116

Post by fweespee_ch »

lojack wrote: post #109
saulrh wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think we would live in a forced back door world for too long. After another 2, 4, or 8 years, we will eventually realize that giving the government a back door to the iPhone did not give it a back door to the myriad of other encrypted communications tools out there. Terrorists will find other ways to hide their communications. I'm going to disagree with you here. Didn't we think, back in 2001, that we'd onl…

How exactly are they supposed to permanently remove all semblance of privacy? Short of infiltrating popular open source projects in plain view and proving the (potentially) unprovable, I don't see how this is possible.

They can make refusal to decrypt a federal felony.

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

#117

Post by walrus01 »

rawnlq wrote: post #36
jfoutz wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

ha, ha:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blueseed

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

#118

Post by rawnlq »

naaaaak wrote: post #62
rawnlq wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

If this becomes a thing, the world is going to run out of islands faster than companies can buy them to evade totalitarian governments.

This is getting really off topic but this is a potential solution: https://www.quora.com/If-someone-were-to-build-an-artificial...

And there's only a handful of companies large enough to do this: http://www.businessinsider.com/25-corporations-bigger-tan-co...

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

#119

Post by joshka »

Even putting the engineers in the position to have to make a choice to resist means that you damage their career prospects whichever way they choose. To be known as 'that guy' who {supported a corrupt government/supported terrorism} polarizes future job choices. There's no real upside. As someone asked to do this, I'd be asking for all future earnings up front from the FBI, so the economic worth of this is really 8 or 9 figures.

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

#120

Post by ohyeshedid »

studentrob wrote: post #74

I honestly feel that engineers need not fall on their swords over this. The decision is up to them, of course. But ultimately, shareholders would expect someone to comply with the court order should the DOJ win. Note that Yahoo was threatened with daily fines of $250,000 for failing to comply in a FISA court case in 2008, and we only just learned this in 2014 [1]. I don't think we would live in a forced back door wor…

That's a little over 91 million in fines over a year. Apple has over 200 billion in cash on hand. They can ride those fines for quite awhile.

Also, there won't be any anti-encryption laws. The risk is backdoor encryption across the board, which could have very similar outcome but isn't what's at stake here.

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