
Florida court says iPhone passcode must be revealed - ColanR
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-38303977
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geofft
Eugene Volokh has a deeper analysis:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-
conspiracy/wp/201...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-
conspiracy/wp/2016/12/14/iphone-user-can-be-forced-to-produce-the-passcode-to-
his-phone-court-rules/)

I was surprised to read that he thinks (and previously thought) this would be
the right ruling. My non-lawyer tl;dr is that your passcode isn't "testimony":
the government knows the passcode exists and that you know passcode, and
therefore it isn't subject to the same protection that would apply to telling
the government some piece of information that may or may not exist and is
inherently interesting. At the very least, he claims, the government is
absolutely in the clear to compel you to _enter_ your passcode and not reveal
what it is.

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voxic11
What if the passcode you use is a confession to another crime?

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geofft
I continue to not be a lawyer, but my guess is the government will make that
particular passcode inadmissible as evidence in the second crime, and then
demand it for prosecuting the first crime. My impression is the legal system
is generally good at Seeing What You Did There and is rarely amused.

See, e.g., _Sega v. Accolade_ , where it turns out that you can't implement a
DRM system that consists solely of forcing people to display your trademark,
and then sue them for trademark infringement.

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diafygi
Serious question: What if he forgot?

Totally not defending him, but if it's been some time since he had to unlock
the device, it's not totally unreasonable for someone to forgot the code to
unlock a device.

I change my passwords regularly, and I've completely forgot my password
several iterations ago.

If you do passwords as you're supposed to (with random words you memorize).
They are very forgettable once you stop having to use them regularly.

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vivekd
That would be a whole different situation from the get go, it would be a fact
based question based on credibility. Courts evaluate people's credibility all
the time and make determinations of credibility. If a judge believes that you
are telling the truth when you say you forgot, he would let you off, if the
judge doesn't believe you, then you'd have to go to jail.

~~~
diafygi
My question wasn't as much focused on the get go. But if my device was
confiscated and we had many months of legal discourse, and I was then
compelled to unlock my device, it's entirely possible that I've lost the
muscle memory for the code. Now I run the chance of permanently locking the
device by just the sheer amount atrophy of password memory.

Anyway, agree that this hypothetical isn't as relevant to this situation, but
compelling someone to give up information they don't actually possess seems
like the slope this is slipping down.

