
Google Also Has Been Ordered to Help Unlock Phones, Records Show - sinak
http://www.wsj.com/article_email/google-has-also-been-ordered-to-help-unlock-phones-records-show-1459342847-lMyQjAxMTE2MDMxMDkzNjAwWj
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ClayFerguson
The feds have gone to ALL device makers and demanded access, using National
Security Letters each time to force the manufacturers to enter into their
clandestine plan, without any public awareness. And if anyone spills the beans
they may just get disappeared into a special holding facility. The US Govt. is
capable of pretty much ANYTHING when it operates under the guise of
"Protecting America." We can thank the Patriot Act (ever version 2 of it) for
all the loss of freedoms and jack-booted state.

~~~
tlrobinson
Why was the San Bernardino FBI/Apple thing not done via NSL?

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darpa_escapee
To set a precedent. They had the ability, but wanted to gain access to any
phone for any case without having to dip into their budget. Even ones that
don't threaten national security.

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ergothus
Article simply counts when the All Writs Act has been used to make a request
of Google and Apple, not focusing on what that help was, and thus, isn't
terribly informative.

For example, when Apple turned over the iCloud data for the San Bernardino
iPhone, I don't know if that was under the All Writs Act or not, but Apple
claimed no problem with doing so. If Google did similar (or, in the one case
this article details, reset a password), that's completely compatible with
Apple's recent stance.

~~~
JamilD
iCloud Data can be obtained with just a search warrant. The power of the All
Writs Act is in making a company do _work_ to assist in decrypting or
accessing data, rather than just handing it over.

From Apple's Legal Process Guidelines [0]:

"It is further ordered that, to the extent that data on the Device is
encrypted, Apple may provide a copy of the encrypted data to law enforcement
but Apple is not required to attempt to decrypt, or otherwise enable law
enforcement's attempts to access any encrypted data."

[0] [http://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/law-enforcement-
guideline...](http://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/law-enforcement-guidelines-
us.pdf)

~~~
devnull42
Correct but they would not have had access to the the iCloud data without
Apple doing work (Resetting password or handing over a copy of the data)

The original comment is correct.

~~~
JamilD
My understanding (and correct me if I'm wrong!) is that handing over a copy of
the data does not fall under All Writs. If the map included warrants for
iCloud data, etc, I'm pretty sure all 50 states would be colored.

~~~
Bluestrike2
You're correct. The All Writs Act is only of use if there are no alternative
remedies. The best way to think of the Act is as a catch-all. It gets used
when other remedies aren't applicable or don't exist.

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samstokes
This quote from "a Google spokesman" seems unambiguous and key:

"We’ve never received an All Writs Act order like the one Apple recently
fought that demands we build new tools that actively compromise our products’
security.... We would strongly object to such an order."

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jonesetc
Devil's advocate, they might not have had to build a new tool.

~~~
r1ch
Seems possible. Pretty much every Android device has disk encryption disabled
by default for performance reasons.

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russell_h
Disk encryption is required to be enabled by default on any device shipped
with Android 6 (Marshmallow). There is an exemption for very slow phones, but
I'd guess that most new medium or high end phones have it enabled now.

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mentat
Without hardware keystore for the key encryption key it's sort of pointless as
you can extract and brute force with any PBKDF2 round count that will be
acceptable for a mobile user.

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bduerst
Hasn't Android supported that since 2012?

[http://developer.android.com/about/versions/android-4.3.html...](http://developer.android.com/about/versions/android-4.3.html#HardwareKeyChain)

~~~
mentat
I'm not sure if / how that's integrated into encrypted disk nor how prevalent
having a TPM like chip is. TrustZone has had a lot of vulnerabilities.

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devindotcom
The ACLU post/map is pretty good. It's based on gov prosecutor report from
October that Apple and Google had complied with All Writs orders scores of
times before. More details at court orders linked to each case.

[https://www.aclu.org/map/all-writs-act-orders-assistance-
tec...](https://www.aclu.org/map/all-writs-act-orders-assistance-tech-
companies)

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ikeboy
What capability is unique to Google? Anyone can replace the rom if the
bootloader is unlocked, and if it isn't, they need the manufacturer, not
Google.

