Terrorism is the use of violence in the pursuit of political or religious aims. Being that the United States of America is such a welcoming country, it has had struggles with terrorist attack prevention. Its recent unfortunate event goes back to December 2, 2015 when Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik went on a senseless terrorist attack in San Bernardino killing 14 and injuring 22.
With an ongoing investigation, the FBI came across Farook’s iPhone; a lead that was too good to pass up. As the FBI worked countless hours trying to provide the highest grade of safety to America, it got very hard and technical very quickly.
The federal judge ordered Apple Corp to assist the FBI in unlocking Farook’s iPhone to retrieve any data to move forward in the investigation. Apple declined to help in efforts to keep their users information private. However, after lives are taken senselessly, it is no longer about privacy, it’s about safety.
Farook was not stupid. According to prosecutors in the initial court filing, Farook essentially disabled his phone from iCloud roughly 1 and a half months prior to the attack. Which means the rest of the information was not backed up onto iCloud. So there is 1 and a half months worth of information saved onto the phone. What kind of information? It could be evidence on another possible terrorist attack, or it could be a conversation about pancakes. No one knows. But it is entirely too risky for the lead to subside.
The upgraded iPhone security features makes it extremely difficult for anyone to get in a phone that they most likely do not own. So much, that after a certain amount of failed passcode attempts, all user data on the phone will delete. Which is essentially why the government is requesting that Apple disables the auto-erase security feature on Farook’s phone, and if they don’t have that capability, create a software that does.
The government is not interested in hacking into everyone’s phone in this case. They have no interest in breaking anyone’s encryption. They simply want to obtain evidence to effectively and fully investigate this tragic act of terror for the victims and their families. Ultimately to ensure and provide future safety and preventing other possible acts of terror on America. No one should expect less of the FBI in their attempt at justice and future safety efforts.
FBI director James Comey published a letter on the Lawfare Blog stating, “We simply want the chance, with a search warrant, to try to guess the terrorist’s passcode without the phone essentially self-destructing and without it taking a decade to guess correctly.”
As Americans, everyone should jump at any opportunity to help the government help this country stay safe.
Apple is arguing the possible devastation if creating the disablement of features falls into the wrong hands; how private information may be exposed. But Apple fails to realize that a terrorist attack can take way more lives than 14. So is privacy more important than making sure America is not blindsided with the ludicrous of another possible San Bernardino episode? Regardless of it all, terrorism affects everyone.
