Original article was first published by Rich McCormic at The Verge.
Just two days after the FBI has confirmed that it got into the iPhone which belonged to the San Bernardino shooter, it offers the same service in a murder case in Arkansas. Cody Hiland, the attorney in the Arkansas case, requested help from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. In the case, two teenagers stand accused of double murder, pleading not guilty. According to their attorney, the suspects are “not concerned about anything on that phone.”
Initially when FBI wanted to negotiate with Apple about unlocking the phone, there was a proposal that it would not be used in other cases. However, now after the FBI managed to unlock the phone, the Bureau accepted the request to unlock the phone in a non-terrorism related case. It is important to note that Apple did help government agencies in the past, but only in getting data available without the need of penetrating the lock and the encryption. The case that brought up all this controversy was when the FBI asked Apple to unlock the iPhone of Syed Farook, who, with the help of his wife, killed 14 people in California early in December 2015.
According to the Associated Press, it is not specified which generation of iPhone is the FBI going to tackle in the Arkansas case, but there is a mention of an iPod as well. One suspect was supposedly using it to communicate with the other and plan the murder. Theoretically, FBI should be able to unlock iPhones up to the 5S generation. In any case, regardless of what will happen next, we are already witnessing a significant change in data protection and security.
EAI Blog will stay tuned to the latest developments in the spheres of security, privacy and encryption. These events have a direct impact on the evolution of the Internet of Things. This coming Friday, an interview with Víctor Rodriguez Doncel, an expert on copyright law, will be published, where this subject will be touched upon again.
