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Judge Favors Apple In iPhone Unlocking Case In New York (google.com)

Posted by timothy on from the at-the-right-time dept.

The Washington Post reports that Apple has prevailed for the moment in its fight with the FBI over the agency's demand that Apple help them break the security of an iPhone — but not in the California case about the phone belonging to San Bernadino shooter Syed Rizwan Farook -- that more famous case, as we mentioned the other day, is of course not the only case with a phone the FBI would like to peek into. New York federal judge James Orenstein scoffs in his 50-page decision at government arguments that Apple should be compelled to produce a software solution that would give them full access to content of the phone belonging to a drug dealer's phone. [Orenstein] found that the All Writs Act does not apply in instances where Congress had the opportunity but failed to create an authority for the government to get the type of help it was seeking, such as having firms ensure they have a way to obtain data from encrypted phones.

He also found that ordering Apple to help the government by extracting data from the iPhone- which belonged to a drug dealer --would place an unreasonable burden on the company....

He also expressed concern about conferring too much authority in the government. "Nothing in the government's arguments suggests any principled limit on how far a court may go in requiring a person or company to violate the most deeply-rooted values to provide assistance to the government the court deems necessary," he said. Whether the same logic will prevail in California is yet unclear; the New York decision is not binding on any other court.

3 of 114 comments (clear)

  1. EDNY by Etherwalk · · Score: 5, Informative

    To be clear, this was a decision from a Federal Magistrate Judge in the Eastern District of NY. (E.g. Long Island and Staten Island). It is not binding on any other court, but it is a Federal Court Decision, which gives it more weight than most equivalent state court decisions, and it is from a fairly well-respected District. (For example, they are responsible for some of the classic electronic discovery cases). They are not the Southern District of New York, which is the rock star of District Courts--but it has enough persuasive weight that most other courts will take it at least a little seriously. They just aren't required to follow it.

  2. This is what I've been saying since day one... by KGIII · · Score: 5, Informative

    Feel free to scroll through my post history. Under what authority does the judge issue these orders? Nobody has been able to cite where this authority is coming from. Lots of people have told me that I'm wrong, in lots of ways. Nobody has actually answered the damned question or shown where the authority comes from. The judge doesn't have this kind of power.

    An example, albeit not a good one, is that even though there's litter on the ground, a judge can't just order a random person to pick it up. There's nobody even charged in this case. There has been no indictment, no arraignment, nothing... There's nobody charged AND if there were, I'm still not sure that the judge has authority to issue this order.

    People are still running around calling it a warrant. It's not a warrant. It was never a warrant.

    --
    "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    1. Re:This is what I've been saying since day one... by bitingduck · · Score: 5, Informative

      The judge actually lays it out pretty well in the order.

      DOJ went to the court to have them issue a writ to order Apple to break into the phone around when the guy in NY was charged. They did this because they thought it had evidence that would be useful in getting a conviction. The guy later plead guilty, which you might think would render the writ moot, but DOJ wanted to continue investigating to see if there was data on the phone to implicate collaborators of the guy who plead guilty. The courts normally defer to the discretion of the investigators and say "yes, while it looks moot, I understand you want to do a thorough investigation and see if there's evidence of criminal behavior of other people, so I'll go ahead and approve this writ". So far so good. Judge Orenstein even explains it more or less that way.

      Until Apple say's "hey, this is putting a burden on us, and we're not a party to any of it, and we're not in the software breaking business. We don't even have tools to break our own after OS7, and while we've previously cooperated a few dozen times on earlier OS versions, this is getting to be both a lot of work and y'all are starting to ask us to make things from scratch that we think are dangerous to make even once. We think you're pushing this AWA thing too far, and here's why." (and they submit their briefs)

      The judge reads it all, has hearings, etc and then says "Yes, Apple, you're correct, the AWA doesn't give me the authority to order you to do what DOJ asks, and all these other laws and precedents back them up, too. Have a nice day. DOJ, you guys are way overreaching, and your attempts to bypass the legislative process are transparent. You lose this way, and that way, and this other way, too. None of your arguments claiming I have that authority are any good. Go away. kthxbye."

      And then the DOJ has the option to appeal to the circuit court, but they'll probably wait to see what they get in California. If they lose about the same way in both places, they might back off. If they get conflicting orders, they'll probably appeal the one they don't like and try to get an appellate court to agree with them, but Apple will be doing the same thing with the order that *they* don't like. If two circuits then come up with different resolutions to the interpretation of the AWA (or other law in the case) then the supreme court will probably take it when it gets appealed to there.