FBI Wants Apple to Create Software to Assist with Brute Forcing Password on iPhone
February 17th, 2016Via: TechDirt:
Apple’s reasonable technical assistance shall accomplish the following three important functions: (1) it will bypass or disable the auto-erase function whether or not it has been enabled; (2) it will enable the FBI to submit passcodes to the SUBJECT DEVICE for testing electronically via the physical device port, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or other protocol available on the SUBJECT DEVICE and (3) it will ensure that when the FBI submits passcodes to the SUBJECT DEVICE, software running on the device will not purposefully introduce any additional delay between passcode attempts beyond what is incurred by Apple hardware.
Related: Apple: A Message to Our Customers
Once upon a time there was a device, a smart phone computer. The government was powerless to access the data inside. The government asked the manufacturer for access, but access was summarily denied. People lived privately, happily ever after. The End
They’re after data stored locally on the phone, which could potentially be very hard to recover. Note: They are not asking Apple to break the encryption, which is not going to happen. They are asking Apple to water down the methods that have been implemented to prevent brute force attacks.
Because local files are going to be difficult or impossible to access doesn’t mean the overall experience can be thought of private. Apps will be leaking information to Apple and others. The physical location of the phone is constantly known to Apple and others. Call content and metadata is available.
So, keeping local files encrypted amounts to a cork floating in a sea of surveillance compromises.
All of the above assumes that they actually don’t have the data already. Maybe it’s possible that they have some low level/currently unknown hardware compromise AND encryption implementation issue (ie low entropy) that has allowed them to recover the data, but they want to engage in a bit of Kabuki theater to hide those capabilities.
Apple fan boys will howl: speculation, tinfoil, etc.
Sure.
If you remember the hard drive firmware thing, I think it’s safe to assume that damn near anything is possible:
https://www.cryptogon.com/?p=46041
This is all about Apple Propaganda in an attempt to retain market share across the universe.
Nobody outside North America wants or trusts American technology after the Snowden revelations.
CISCO is really feeling the heat and since most software and components are owned by Israeli companies, they too are taking a financial hit.
America was building its future on technology but Snowden burned them all, and we have only viewed or seen a very minor amount of documentation.
At current rate it will take 20-620 years to free all the Snowden documents
https://cryptome.org/2013/11/snowden-tally.htm
There is a pretty good interview here:
Cryptome’s searing critique of Snowden Inc.
Reboot FM
Transmediale 2016
Host Pit Schultz interviews John Young and Deborah Natsios
February 06, 2016
http://www.timshorrock.com/?p=2354