If you consider all of the time and effort that they put into this case, they spent a hell of a lot more than $1M. We're focusing so much on it because it a single line item.
FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
151–160 of 206 posts
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
Indeed. Americans need to wake up to the fact that these spooks simply cannot be trusted. The very concept of trust is alien to their culture. Would be nice of we could count on congress to provide adequate oversight.
It's amazing to me too that the very concept of an "unwarrantable" space is simply impossible to conceive.
I don't disagree, but do some countries truly publicly accept unwarranted spaces? I can imagine most governments wouldn't really want to give up that ability if possible.
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just think of how many lives were saved by the data they got off that phone. Oh wait...
Is it unreasonable to think there is legitimately valuable Intel on that phone? I'd say it's at least plausible, maybe even likely lives can be saved by getting at messages on a known terrorists phone.
Yes. The FBI had offers (from credible firms) to crack the phone from day 2. (After they screwed it up and started talking about it.) They didn't take those offers because they were trying to force Apple into a larger breach.
Why did they risk it? Because they knew there was nothing of value on the phone. If this was the criminal's only phone we might hypothesize that it has valuable info on it. But when the criminal destroyed one phone and didn't bother to destroy the other it suggests there's nothing on it.
I'm sure it has more than zero data. The FBI merely has to claim that knowing if criminals play Candy Crush is helpful to justify it, in one sense. But enough to justify the trouble they put Apple through? Doubtful.
Enough to justify the decades of distrust they sowed in the security community? Not a chance.
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
I see two ways to interpret what he said, and I'm kind of appalled at both interpretations: (1) "We can't afford to pay someone every time we need to bypass security, therefore we need the ability to force third parties to do this work for free": um, OK. -or- (2) "Bypassing security takes too much time and effort, therefore we need a backdoor": even more horrifying, even though he's repeatedly denied that this is the…
He doesn't want a "backdoor" just special treatment time and again.
It's not an either-or. They want the backdoor so they don't have to ask, and they want a new backdoor created anytime they ask.
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's just politicking, its "worth it" because they get to flex their muscle and show the world that they don't need apple's cooperation to get what they want.
And because it wasn't their own money.
That's an important point. They're paid our money, to plot ways to spend more of our money on marketing and lawyers, to misinform us.
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#156Given that they found no relevant information on his work phone, exactly as experts and reasonable amateurs and common men predicted, how was it "worth it" as he claims? Is it that wasting huge sums of taxpayer money while attacking civil rights and attempting to instantiate a police surveillance state with no privacy is simply "worth it" no matter what, even if pointless?
It was worth it because they didn't know that beforehand. Now the FBI are sure that the attackers weren't in contact with other ISIS members. The FBI thinks that information is worth the $1.2M+ they paid. How could they possibly have known that without unlocking the phone?
On the work phone, sure. Yay.
You do know that they destroyed their personal phones, right? And that it's been months now, wasted bickering with Apple even if there would have been any leads.
> How could they possibly have known that without unlocking the phone?
Smart money says they already unlocked it with an exploit and knew there was nothing, then played legal games with Apple until they started losing, and to exit gracefully they accepted the offer of one of the many firms begging to extract data from the phone for them.
They have the NSA's phone number. They were playing helpless for a reason.
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
not sure how cracking encryption will "un-kill" even one of those people.
Who said it will? It's to prevent it happening again.
What? The government pwning some terrorists iPhone will prevent terrorist attacks from happening again? How? I'm completely gobsmacked at the line of reasoning here.
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a lot of double-speak. They know that removing the timeout so they can try thousands of passwords per second opens up a huge security hole. What he's saying is "we want it both ways". We don't want to take away security for users, we just want to make it easier for someone who's not the owner of the phone to get into it.
The government owned the iPhone in question.
Well reset it, and start downloading pictures of cats, what's the problem?
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#159I wish people who paid lots of government money for things were always forced to do so out of their salary. For example: we will pay you $X per year in exchange for giving you the responsibility to make up to 10 big purchases; each time you purchase however, 1% of the proposed sum comes out of that $X salary; now then, how judicious will you be? One thing Ron Paul did in Congress years ago, after one of those stupid…
Reminds me of Not Yours To Give: http://www.constitution.org/cons/crockett.htm
Thanks for that link. Great read.
Re: FBI Paid More Than $1M to Hack San Bernardino iPhone
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
Who said it will? It's to prevent it happening again.
What? The government pwning some terrorists iPhone will prevent terrorist attacks from happening again? How? I'm completely gobsmacked at the line of reasoning here.
The reasoning is that there may be new information that helps identify conspirators or abettors. We all know the chances of finding smoking-gun type evidence on that phone was slim, but that doesn't mean you ignore possible leads when attempting to piece together how a crime was committed. Just because the shooter didn't intend to leave any evidence on the company-issued phone, doesn't mean that there wouldn't have been meaningful data on there that would advance the investigation and generate valuable leads. Think GPS info, or items that complete a timeline, etc.
Here's an example. Suppose they uncovered GPS info from the phone that showed that the shooter visited a particular location frequently in the days leading up to the attack. FBI checks that location out, and discovers that it is implicated in another ongoing investigation for money laundering. The other investigation wasn't tied to terrorism, but this thread creates a link and enables another source of support to be found and squashed.
My example is just an illustration of one of many possible ways the data on the phone could advance the case. It's absolutely worth pursuing.
To be clear, I'm 100% opposed to any attempts at government backdoors, and I sided with Apple when they refused the FBI's request initially, but that doesn't mean the Bureau should just shrug their shoulders and not do their job.