James Comey, FBI director, defends government’s stance, encourages ‘deep breath’ on Apple debate

With the debate escalating over whether law enforcement can force Apple to hack the iPhone of the San Bernardino shooters, FBI Director James Comey sought to bring the focus back to the victims of the terrorist attack.

The legal battle over access to data on the shooter’s cellphone isn’t about setting a precedent that could grant law enforcement access to cellphones in future investigations but rather it is about thoroughly investigating the attack, said Mr. Comey in a letter posted Sunday night on the blog Lawfare.

“Maybe the phone holds the clue to finding more terrorists. Maybe it doesn’t,” Mr. Comey said. “But we can’t look the survivors in the eye, or ourselves in the mirror, if we don’t follow this lead.”

The showdown is over a court order issued last week that would require Apple to to provide technical assistance to the FBI so that agents could attempt to break the four-digit password that protects the work-issued cellphone belonging to deceased gunman Syed Rizwan Farook. Investigators are seeking access to data on the phone to piece together more information about the Dec. 2 terrorist attack that killed 14 people in San Bernardino, California.

Apple has indicated that it will challenge the ruling, with CEO Tim Cook calling the court order government overreach that could set a dangerous precedent when it comes to breaking encryption security features on customers’ iPhones.

Mr. Comey tried to address the concern that has been raised by the tech giant — that if Apple complies with this order they will have created a technique that law enforcement will call on them to use again and again when they seek to retrieve data from other suspect’s phones in the future.

“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. That’s it,” Mr. Comey said. “We don’t want to break anyone’s encryption or set a master key loose on the land.”

While the case is now set for a court hearing, the battle over privacy versus national security interests is also playing out in the public relations sphere. In court filings Friday, the Justice Department accused Apple of opposing the court order because of the “perceived negative impact on its reputation and marketing strategy were it to provide the ordered assistance to the government.”

The company’s stance has drawn a line in the sand for law enforcement organizations, fellow tech companies, and civil liberties advocates, who have all begun to take sides on the matter.

“I hope folks will take a deep breath and stop saying the world is ending, but instead use that breath to talk to each other,” Mr. Comey said. “Although this case is about the innocents attacked in San Bernardino, it does highlight that we have awesome new technology that creates a serious tension between two values we all treasure — privacy and safety. That tension should not be resolved by corporations that sell stuff for a living. It also should not be resolved by the FBI, which investigates for a living. It should be resolved by the American people deciding how we want to govern ourselves in a world we have never seen before.”