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TECHNOLOGY A23
Wednesday 2 March 2016
Can the FBI force a company to break into its own products?
BRANDON BAILEY This Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016 file photo shows an iPhone in Washington. only telecommunications
AP Technology Writer carriers and specifically ex-
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Associated Press cludes “information service
Can the FBI force a com- providers” — including In-
pany like Apple to extract law known as the All Writs tion that he wouldn’t be scope. Tech industry and ternet companies such as
data from a customer’s Act allows courts to compel civil liberties groups have Apple and Google. Exten-
smartphone? In the fight private parties to assist law named, said Apple be- mostly succeeded in block- sive negotiation produced
over an iPhone used by an enforcement. But Orenstein ing those efforts. a law that preserved the
extremist killer in San Ber- said that shouldn’t apply lieves Orenstein’s ruling is Even before Orenstein’s rul- wiretapping ability authori-
nardino, some legal experts when, in his words, “Con- ing, some legal experts said ties already had without
say Congress has never ex- gress has considered legis- both persuasive and rele- in recent weeks that the his- adding new types of sur-
plicitly granted that power. lation that would achieve tory of CALEA suggests that veillance capabilities, said
And now a federal judge the same result but has not vant to the issues at stake in authorities are overreach- Deirdre Mulligan, co-direc-
agrees in a similar case. adopted it.” ing in the San Bernardino tor of the Center for Law &
In a New York drug case The New York ruling isn’t San Bernardino. case. Technology at the Univer-
that echoes the much binding on the magistrate The law was narrowly fo- sity of California, Berkeley
higher-profile San Bernardi- in the San Bernardino case. In that case, the FBI wants cused and “the product The Federal Communica-
no dispute, U.S. Magistrate And federal authorities of years of public debate, tions
James Orenstein has ruled said Monday they’ll ap- Apple to create software with many compromises on Commission updated CA-
the government doesn’t peal Orenstein’s decision. both sides of that debate,” LEA-related regulations in
have authority to make But a senior Apple execu- that would bypass some said Ahmed Ghappour, 2005 to extend the govern-
Apple pull information off tive, who spoke on condi- a visiting professor who ment’s sway to voice-over-
a suspect’s iPhone. The iPhone security features, focuses on tech issues at Internet phone services.
judge said in his ruling that the University of California Moves to expand it further,
Congress has already con- making it easier to guess Hastings law school. “That’s however, have fizzled, ac-
sidered, but rejected, ex- what Congress is for.” cording to a report by the
tending the government’s the passcode that would As with the iPhone dispute Congressional Research
authority in this fashion. today, the 1994 law was Service, which cited pro-
Orenstein cited the history unlock it. enacted at a time when posals for extending the
of a 20-year-old federal the nation’s police agen- law to “a wide range of
law — one that requires Prosecutors say they’re cies were struggling to technology services,” in-
phone companies to assist keep up with new tech- cluding instant messaging
police in conducting court- only seeking what amounts nology. Authorities feared and video game chats.
authorized wiretaps. Con- that a switch from old-fash- “This is a power that Con-
gress has resisted attempts to routine cooperation; ioned copper wire to digi- gress has had numerous
over the years to extend tal phone networks would opportunities to extend
that authority to tech com- Apple and its supporters hinder their eavesdropping and has chosen not to,”
panies like Apple, accord- capabilities. said Mulligan.
ing to experts who have say the request is unprec- CALEA intentionally covers Federal authorities argued
studied the law, known as that CALEA isn’t relevant to
the Communications Assis- edented and would make either iPhone case. But Ap-
tance for Law Enforcement ple and its supporters are
Act, or CALEA. likely to cite CALEA in the
Federal prosecutors have San Bernardino case, said
argued that a much older Alex Abdo, an ACLU attor-
ney who is helping draft a
other iPhones vulnerable to “friend-of-the-court” brief
on Apple’s behalf. He said
hacking by authorities and the All Writs Act can only
be used to enforce author-
criminals alike. ity the government already
has, such as a legal search
By contrast, U.S. phone car- warrant.
The history of CALEA shows
riers have long been re- that if Congress wanted
the government to have
quired to design and build the authority it’s invoking
against Apple, “it would
their networks in ways that have given it already,” said
Abdo, echoing the New
allow federal wiretaps of York magistrate’s ruling.q
digital phone calls. That
government authority
stems from CALEA, a 1994
law that drew heated de-
bate before it passed, and
even more controversy on
occasions when federal of-
ficials sought to expand its
