<story><title>Apple VP: The FBI wants to roll back safeguards that keep us ahead of criminals</title><url>https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/apple-vp-the-fbi-wants-to-roll-back-safeguards-that-keep-us-a-step-ahead-of-criminals/2016/03/06/cceb0622-e3d1-11e5-a6f3-21ccdbc5f74e_story.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>rdtsc</author><text>This is what good PR looks like.&lt;p&gt;In cases like this it is always FBI and the govt. which usually have the PR upper hand. They wait to find a most abhorent crime that nobody sane would want to defend (terrorism seems to work well today) and use that as an example. &amp;quot;Oh look everyone, Apple doesn&amp;#x27;t want to fight terrorism. We are keeping people safe and what side are they on?&amp;quot;. It is almost too easy.&lt;p&gt;Fighting that is an uphill battle. One can present the technical details (&amp;quot;They could have cracked that particular model themselves&amp;quot;) or appeal to more general ideals of freedom and privacy etc. Those typically are not as effective in convincing the average joe out there when the other side uses the &amp;quot;T&amp;quot; word.&lt;p&gt;But here they are playing the same card as FBI -- using a crime that most people can fear --  their phone getting stolen, their identity used. Everyone has heard stories, has friends at least who this happened to and so on. So it works well. Terrorism is more scary, but this is more real. Great work.</text></comment>
<story><title>Apple VP: The FBI wants to roll back safeguards that keep us ahead of criminals</title><url>https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/apple-vp-the-fbi-wants-to-roll-back-safeguards-that-keep-us-a-step-ahead-of-criminals/2016/03/06/cceb0622-e3d1-11e5-a6f3-21ccdbc5f74e_story.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>clhodapp</author><text>What do we think the likelihood is that at least some of the three-letter agencies already have the capability to get into a locked iPhone (likely their method would be based on some sort of baseband vulnerability) and this whole thing is simply a bid to gain the ability to &lt;i&gt;openly&lt;/i&gt; unlock these phones?</text></comment>