By Debra Houston | A hearing on the Apple and FBI clash begins March 22. In my last comment I explained why Apple refuses to invent a path to unlock San Bernardino terrorist Syed Farook’s iPhone. Hackers would uncover the path and invade our privacy and worse. I noted, “This isn’t about San Bernardino.”
Well, the president has unwittingly proved my point. On March 11 he said, “If it’s technologically possible to make an impenetrable device or system, where encryption is so strong that there’s no key . . . then how do we apprehend the child pornographer? . . . What mechanisms do we have to even do things like tax enforcement?”
Did he say tax enforcement? I shudder at the thought of Lois Lerner fishing for dirt on my iPhone. Thanks, Mr. President, for confirming my suspicion. The FBI bases its case on the All Writs Act from the Judiciary Act of 1789. Correct me, but as inventive as he was, old Ben Franklin never owned an iPhone.
Understand that in your possession you carry a database of intimate details about you and your family. Then reconsider the president’s child pornography comment. Would you want a child molester to hack data from your iPhone and identify your child’s school and activity whereabouts?
In a recent Time Magazine article, Apple CEO Tim Cook says that hackers have evolved “…from the hobbyist in the basement to huge sophisticated companies.” He also fears foreign agents inside and outside the U.S. hacking our phones. He says strong encryption is needed to defend public safety, national security, and individual privacy.
Cook compares himself to a FedEx guy who delivers goods, not stores and opens them. With a subpoena, he says, the FBI can obtain vital data — such as call patterns, locations, incoming/outgoing numbers — from carriers like Sprint. We may feel violated, but at least our conversations are secure.
Cook calls for a public debate and for Congress to hold hearings and write legislation. Of course the government prefers the courts. I think we must oppose judges making our laws instead of our elected representatives.
“It’s not about one phone,” Cook says. “It’s very much about the future.”
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