NemWan

ttollerton said:

Dai said:

Did the voters of North Carolina want this? A rushed bill discussed in virtual secret doesn't seem like a democratic outcome. I'll stand corrected f the members of the NC legislature stood on a ticket of undoing anti-discriminatory legislation, but I doubt that's what happened. What "the voters" want is seldom what the people they vote for actually do, and what the elected do is seldom what voters want.

You're right.  Obamacare being the perfect example of your last sentence. 

With regard to this situation...this state legislation is in response to an ordinance passed in the city of Charlotte that was extremely controversial.  The state passed its measure to strike the local measure down.  

They did a HELL of a lot more than that. In a one-day whirlwind intentionally engineered to make public debate impossible, North Carolina instantly became the most bigotry-friendly state in the union.

Sir_Turkey said:

sog35 said:

What the FBI wanted Apple to do was a software hack.  With software hacks you can access phones WITHOUT possession.  And with a backdoor you can access MILLIONS of phones at the same time. In your home. IN your bedroom. That is what I'm afraid of.

Why does it matter to you if the FBI can access private data on suspicion of criminal actively ? Why are you "afraid" ?

The U.S. is not the only government with jurisdiction over iPhone users in the world. You can't pick which ones to secure it from.

Sir_Turkey said:

sog35 said:

What the FBI wanted Apple to do was a software hack.  With software hacks you can access phones WITHOUT possession.  And with a backdoor you can access MILLIONS of phones at the same time. In your home. IN your bedroom. That is what I'm afraid of.

Why does it matter to you if the FBI can access private data on suspicion of criminal actively ? Why are you "afraid" ?

The U.S. is not the only government with jurisdiction over iPhone users in the world. You can't pick which ones to secure it from.

In the bad old days Apple intentionally down-clocked or limited the bus speed or other features of low-end Macintoshes out of fear the professional market wouldn't buy the premium machine. Now Apple is well run enough that they don't have to worry about cannibalizing themselves. It's nice to see this lower-end iPhone is going to be virtually full powered.

In the worst case that government gets to seize source code and signing keys, Apple's obligation to its customers' security would be to make what was seized obsolete. Apple would have to treat it exactly as though their keys and code had been stolen by hackers. It would take time for outside experts to study and make use of the source code. By then, Apple could (hopefully) replace and revoke their old keys so that all devices not already under government control can be updated to no longer accept updates using the old key. Then release a new version of iOS.

Apple can regain control of their product because they also design the only hardware their software runs on. Future iOS devices would not accept GovtOS. So what does the government do then? Demand permanent access to all future OS source code and keys? This insanity would just increase until Congress either shuts it down with laws that limit law enforcement from doing this, or at the opposite extreme creates laws that explicitly obligate tech companies to conduct mass surveillance of their customers which would be stored on behalf of the government — which would be beyond the pale and comparable to telling phone companies they had to record every call.

Once companies like Apple have designed best-practices for privacy and security that deny the company any knowledge of customer data, there is no reason for the company to ever again have that knowledge except for government mandated surveillance.