Apple’s Final Brief Heading Into Federal Court

Greg Kumparak and Matthew Panzarino, writing for TechCrunch:

During a call last week about the filing, Apple executives, including general counsel Bruce Sewell, spoke in a way that can be best characterized as surprised and outraged. The FBI’s tone shift from legal argument to character assassination in its filings had clearly taken Apple off guard.

The tone of today’s filing and subsequent call was much more cold and precise. Apple got some time to consider the best way to respond and went with dissecting the FBI’s technical arguments in a series of precise testimonies by its experts.

Where the FBI filing last week relied on invective, Apple’s this week relies on poking holes in critical sections of the FBI’s technical narrative.

TechCrunch has the full brief embedded at the bottom of the post. It’s worth reading — inevitably some of it is inside baseball legalese, but it seems clear to me that Apple’s lawyers have made a tremendous effort to make it as accessible as possible. On some points they simply tear apart the government’s factual errors.

See also: This roundup of Twitter commentary on today’s brief by Xeni Jardin at BoingBoing.

★ Tuesday, 15 March 2016