Linked List: February 25, 2016

Thursday, 25 February 2016

Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Microsoft Plan to Support Apple 

Deepa Seetharaman and Jack Nicas, reporting for the WSJ:

Several tech companies, including Google parent Alphabet Inc., Facebook Inc. and Microsoft Corp., plan to file a joint motion supporting Apple Inc. in its court fight against the Justice Department over unlocking an alleged terrorist’s iPhone, according to people familiar with the companies’ plans.

At least one other tech company plans to be included in a joint amicus brief next week generally supporting Apple’s position that unlocking the iPhone would undermine tech firms’ efforts to protect their users’ digital security, these people said. Twitter Inc. also plans to support Apple in a motion, though it is unclear if it will join the combined filing, another person familiar said.

Microsoft President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith told Congress on Thursday that his company would file a motion supporting Apple.

Nice.

Apple’s Motion to Vacate FBI Order 

A clear, cogent read. I often shy away from reading legal motions because they’re so often written in dense legalese, but this one is clear.

This stuck out to me:

Congress knows how to impose a duty on third parties to facilitate the government’s decryption of devices. Similarly, it knows exactly how to place limits on what the government can require of telecommunications carriers and also on manufacturers of telephone equipment and handsets. And in CALEA, Congress decided not to require electronic communication service providers, like Apple, to do what the government seeks here. Contrary to the government’s contention that CALEA is inapplicable to this dispute, Congress declared via CALEA that the government cannot dictate to providers of electronic communications services or manufacturers of telecommunications equipment any specific equipment design or software configuration.

In the section of CALEA entitled “Design of features and systems configurations,” 47 U.S.C. § 1002(b)(1), the statute says that it “does not authorize any law enforcement agency or officer —

(1) to require any specific design of equipment, facilities, services, features, or system configurations to be adopted by any provider of a wire or electronic communication service, any manufacturer of telecommunications equipment, or any provider of telecommunications support services.

(2) to prohibit the adoption of any equipment, facility, service, or feature by any provider of a wire or electronic communication service, any manufacturer of telecommunications equipment, or any provider of telecommunications support services.

What Apple is arguing is that the All Writs Act is intended only to fill the gaps covering scenarios not covered by other laws, but CALEA (the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act) is a law that was passed specifically to cover exactly this sort of scenario. This strikes me as a very compelling argument.

Microsoft Will File Amicus Brief Supporting Apple 

Dina Bass, reporting for Bloomberg:

Microsoft Corp. backs Apple Inc. in its fight with the U.S. government over unlocking a terrorist’s iPhone, said President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith.

The company will file an amicus brief to support Apple next week, Smith said at a congressional hearing to discuss the need for new legislation to govern privacy, security and law enforcement in the age of Internet-based cloud services.

Nice.

Apple to Tighten iCloud Backup Encryption 

Tim Bradshaw, reporting for the Financial Times:

Apple is working on new ways to strengthen the encryption of customers’ iCloud backups in a way that would make it impossible for the company to comply with valid requests for data from law enforcement, according to people familiar with its plans.

The move would bolster Apple customers’ security against hackers but also frustrate investigators who are currently able to obtain data from Apple’s servers through a court order. Apple has complied with thousands of such orders in the past.

Developing such technology is in some ways more complex than adding the kind of device-level security that Apple introduced to the iPhone in 2014 with its iOS 8 update.

Building new protections that mean Apple no longer has access to iCloud encryption keys may inconvenience some customers. Such a change would most likely mean that customers who forget their iCloud password may be left unable to access their photos, contacts and other personal information that is backed up to Apple’s systems.

The Dangerous All Writs Act Precedent in the Apple Encryption Case 

Amy Davidson, writing for The New Yorker:

It is essential to this story that the order to Apple is not a subpoena: it is issued under the All Writs Act of 1789, which says that federal courts can issue “all writs necessary or appropriate in aid of their respective jurisdictions and agreeable to the usages and principles of law.” Read as a whole, this simply means that judges can tell people to follow the law, but they have to do so in a way that, in itself, respects the law. The Act was written at a time when a lot of the mechanics of the law still had to be worked out. But there are qualifications there: warnings about the writs having to be “appropriate” and “agreeable,” not just to the law but to the law’s “principles.” The government, in its use of the writ now, seems to be treating those caveats as background noise. If it can tell Apple, which has been accused of no wrongdoing, to sit down and write a custom operating system for it, what else could it do?

Lost amid the technical debate over encryption is the legal debate over this incredibly broad application of the All Writs Act.

Twitter’s Missing Manual 

Eevee:

Here, then, is a list of all the non-obvious things about Twitter that I know. Consider it both a reference for people who aren’t up to their eyeballs in Twitter, and an example of how these hidden features can pile up. I’m also throwing in a couple notes on etiquette, because I think that’s strongly informed by the shape of the platform.

Sharp Accepts Foxconn Takeover Bid 

Huge news for both companies. Interesting for Apple, too.

Update:

A deal to take over Japanese electronics giant Sharp by Taiwanese manufacturer Foxconn, has been thrown into question by a last minute delay.

Foxconn said it had received new information from Sharp which needed to be clarified.

Whoops.