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Snowden: FBI's Claim It Can't Unlock The San Bernardino iPhone Is 'Bullshit' (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Edward Snowden, the whistleblower whose NSA revelations sparked a debate on mass surveillance, has waded into the arguments over the FBI's attempt to force Apple to help it unlock the iPhone 5C of one of the San Bernardino shooters. The FBI says that only Apple can deactivate certain passcode protections on the iPhone, which will allow law enforcement to guess the passcode by using brute-force. Talking via video link from Moscow to the Common Cause Blueprint for a Great Democracy conference, Snowden said: "The FBI says Apple has the 'exclusive technical means' to unlock the phone. Respectfully, that's bullshit." Snowden then went on to tweet his support for an American Civil Liberties Union report saying that the FBI's claims in the case are fraudulent. Apple's clash with the FBI comes to a head in California this month when the two will meet in federal court to debate whether the smartphone manufacturer should be required to weaken security settings on the iPhone of the shooter.
If the NSA can do it, it would probably not be allowed as evidence in court. If the FBI did it, maybe it would.
This all boils down to legal precedent.
Always has been.
We know the FBI *can* unlock it without help, but we also know that this brings with it a certain level of technical risk that adjusted firmware would not (whereas the firmware would pose a certain level of privacy risk), and an attempt rate that is abysmal at best.
The ACLU report specifically states that they can desolder the storage chip, copy the storage entire, put in a socket (no risk there), plonk the chip in, try, and if it fails - restore the storage to the chip (or a model with equal behavior and characteristics). Several of these steps come with risk, and all of it comes with it the fact that it takes time. A lot of time. Even with a rig that pops the chip out and drops another one in, with chips going on a merry-go-around for reprogramming after N attempts, it's a lot slower than a firmware that would allow an effectively unlimited number of attempts.
Push comes to shove, they can try decapping it and looking straight at the bare metal. But as anybody who does forensic work would know, that's not exactly your go-to method; figuring out the password directly, or figuring out a pre-existing backdoor to bypass protection entirely, would be very much preferable. If disabling the maximum number of attempts is hypothetically an option as long as you can get the manufacturer to agree to do it, hell yes it's on the table.
He's the only public talking head who actually had clearance and no further obligation to protect information covered under it.
He's the only guy that we can trust to even start a legitimate dialog on the subject.
If we're all speculating on what a secret closed door club can do, who better than A MEMBER OF THAT CLUB to speak out? Are you retarded somehow as to miss that?
It's entirely plausible to me that Apple built something the FBI can't get into using their existing tools and techniques and Snowden has produced no evidence to the contrary. Don't make shit up.
Naturally his fans are obligated to defend this now and build a fictional world view around it, condemning anyone that fails to accept their bullshit... It's all enough to make you hope for a large bolide impact.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
The FBI wants a tool that is ready for a long list of other domestic cases. A tool that is portable, federal support for state law enforcement ready. The domestic, court ready, master key for a generation of phones.
"“The request we got from the government in this case is, ‘Take this tool and put it on a hard drive, send it to the FBI,’ and they’d load it onto their computer,” "(March 2, 2016)
http://nypost.com/2016/03/02/f...
Its not a "one-off" or just for this case tool.
The NSA owns that tool set, missions, contracts, bids, contractors and the wins that result. The funding and fame follow the wins . The no bid contracts and experts gravitate to the NSA ensuring every generation of telco product is wide open to the US gov and mil. Only the NSA can then secure, support or plan any such missions.
When federal and state law enforcement get in on the bids for the same tool sets? Any state contractor, federal contractor can then sell their tools at a low cost and the national publicity goes to the FBI.
Political leaders see new hi tech contractor jobs in FBI support in their states and the contractors that get the new work can the support the local political leaders re election that got them the new FBI contracts.
Everyone is now winning, new federal cash is flowing out, political leaders helped their local hi tech sector with new gov work, the FBI has a flood of new cases in open court and wins.
What was the NSA's missions, fame, role, new experts, no bid contracts, code and skills now in the hands of state officials, local law enforcement, federal gov workers, anyone working with US federal law enforcement around the world. All the ex staff and former staff who got invited in on the methods.
Anyone interesting stops using US branded trapdoor and backdoor ready turnkey network, telco and computer devices.
A few decades of easy tracking, voice prints, effortless decryption is lost in months in open court.
The cults, faith groups, criminals, dealers, embassy "agents" who once had to be seen with a phone just to keep the cover as been a normal person that was always reachable all go dark.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
The NSA may already have the information on the cellphone, from when it was sniffed as it passed over the interwebs.
Assuming the FBI is privy to the NSA's capabilities.
This is a terrorism case, so the FBI and the NSA are supposed to cooperate.
If Apple can write code and copy it up to the phone, then the capabilities for doing so already exist. So why doesn't the FBI do the work themselves? I'm sure Apple would be willing to help with the electronic part - that's just specs. I think there is more at play here than whether Apple can or can't....
You need to unlock the phone to make it accept unsigned updates. You need a signed update to unlock it. So only someone with the key can unlock it.
The FBI either doesn't have a copy of the key or doesn't want to admit they do. The keys for this kind of thing are guarded by men with guns and used only on airgapped machines, at least in any competent org, and it is highly unlikely that apple would knowingly give a copy of the FBI without word of it leaking out. Another branch of government may have obtained a copy clandestinely, however, either directly from Apple or from a foreign intelligence service.
I keep hearing this but what does it matter? The government does whatever it pleases without consequence. The NSA admitted to illegally spying on members of congress. Nobody was fired or even given a letter of reprimand.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Well, Snowden's statement is bullshit. The firmware code is signed and without the private key to sign the firmware, it won't run on the iPhone even if you can perfectly write another one. Unless he means the FBI is having Apple's signing private key. If he believes so, he should prove it.
Achille Talon
Hop!
If the NSA can do it, it would probably not be allowed as evidence in court. If the FBI did it, maybe it would.
Which of the dead shooters are we taking to court?
The government deals with the consequences of their actions all the time. The whole Apple-FBI conflict is happening out in the open for every one to see. No classified FISA involvement or equally classified NSL's being used to force Apple into doing anything. The government is following the law and as a consequence they have already lost some high profile court proceedings over their similar requests. I predict they will lose the current FBI-Apple case as well. On the other hand the NSA serves a whole different purpose than the FBI and it's efforts are concentrated in the realm of foreign espionage which is the organizations mandate. And the only law the NSA follows on it's foreign activities is don't get caught. This is standard operating procedure for every foreign state espionage service around the world. You cannot condemn the NSA without factoring in the fact that there are some very powerful and well funded state security agencies in the world whose entire purpose is to conduct espionage operations against the US. US industrial, military, and political structures are constantly being targeted by both allies and enemies. Then you also have the non-state actors actively looking for ways to attack the US or anything associated with the US. However with all the hyperbolic statements being tossed around you would think that the US is the only country on the planet who conducts espionage operations around the world.
The government has a very long history that shows that they are no more credible than Snowden. The entire kabuki is to convince the public that encryption is an evil tool of terrorists, and it's working.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I have often said how much I appreciate Snowden's sacrifice and gifts to us. I find him, while a bit sleazy, to be a greater patriot than most of the folks I know - and I served eight years in the Marines. That's saying something - I think.
So, I've gotta ask...
What makes folks think he's privy to this information or knows their full capacity?
What makes everyone believe he's telling us this of his own volition?
How is he an authority on this particular issue, it seems likely to be beyond his scope?
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
(Note that Microsoft has already been forced to give its source code to the Russian security services, and it seems likely that Apple has succumbed to similar pressures.)
Assuming the FBI is privy to the NSA's capabilities.
No problem, just subcontract it via China since they will be privy to the NSA's capabilities.
Did you people really think a private contractor in Hawaii was likely to be the only leak from that bunch of toy soldiers?
This is domestic terrorism, there is slight evidence that there was any foreign involvement or planning. The FBI needs to make the case that there is a need for cooperation. With this phone however there is not very much probable cause to assume there is any evidence of value on that phone. The FBI wishes such data exists of course, which would allow them to open up *new* investigations only, but their real motivation is not in finding any foreign mastermind of the shootings but instead they want to crack open that door with Apple to enable relatively mundane phone cracking in the future for low level cases (drug crimes, financial crimes, etc).
The FBI *claims* it's a one time only request and we should accept their word on this, except that their word has proven to be unreliable in the past and they certainly can not make this one-time-only pinkie promise on behalf of the entire US goverment or all governments around the world. Once Apple caves in then we already know there is a New York DA highly interested in getting Apple's help fishing through a few buckets full of phones. The courts rely on precedence and this would set a very large precedent for future requests.
Apple is correct in taking this case all the way to the supreme court if they have to. It is their right to do so, and they are in no way unpatriotic for asserting their rights.
The NSA is supposed to deal with foreign intelligence only. The FBI is supposed to deal with domestic criminal investigations only. The fact that both agencies have been trying to expand their reach so that there is functional overlap is evidence that the two agencies are not sharing their secrets with each other so readily.
This is also a domestic terrorism case with no evidence that there is any foreign involvement except for the gut feeling that all terrorism comes from a secret mastermind hidden on a island somewhere off the shore of New Jersey. We know who the shooters were. We know who they called and when, from both the work phone in question and the other phones that were actively used by the shooters. The case is essentially closed, and would be closed if it weren't for politics. The NSA is not going to open its kimono wide to the FBI for a simple case like this one. Cooperation or no, the need to know process is still in effect.
Because people will listen to him, because he's Snowden.
I've been saying the same thing for months: the key is stored (albeit encrypted itself) in flash, so all you need to do is to back up the flash chip and you've got as many goes as you need, which with a four digit PIN chosen by humans isn't that many. But even though you can point this out the relevant details in Apple's documentation, people just refuse to believe that the government can get into an iPhone without Apple's help.
That actually kinds of mystifies me. Why would anyone believe that a government that (in part at least) created Stuxnet would be stymied by an iPhone? Whatever the reason, Snowden's imprimatur seems to help them get over it.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Counsel: Mr Aldridge are you considering the question or are you just dead?
[silence]
Counsel: I think I'd better take a look m'lord.
[looks inside coffin]
Counsel: No further questions m'lord.
Judge: What do you mean, no further questions? You can't just dump a dead body in my court and say 'no further questions'. I demand an explanation.
Counsel: There are no easy answers in this case m'lord.
However it seems, reality can be as weird as Monty Python: http://www.scmp.com/news/asia/...
Trump's first day in office he'll build a wall along the Atlantic and Snowden will have trouble climbing over it.
The ACLU's site explains it quite well. It has nothing to do with the firmware, it's the idea of copying the Toshiba NAND chip first. Install a test socket onto the board, then start running the password attempts. Get locked out, or the chip erased, pop another NAND chip in with the same image written on it. Repeat until you get in. This would probably take a long time, copying and swapping a chip for every ten attempts. But a process that is annoying is still a long ways from a process that is technically "impossible" as the FBI is claiming.
Most people in the US use encryption, they just don't realize it. Anyone who's ever checked their bank account online has used encryption.
The bank is using and controlling the encryption, not the customer. And the government will never have to ask them twice to turn everything over to them. The problem (to the government) is when the customer controls the encryption and is willing to protect his own rights.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
What makes folks think he's privy to this information or knows their full capacity?
While he's far from the first to voice public dissent against the NSA and their supposed capabilities, he's the only one so far they've ever publicly decried and gone through such lengths to capture and silence. The effort level of their response alone tends to strongly validate his claims.
What makes everyone believe he's telling us this of his own volition?
I don't think there's any question at least that he feels his hand was forced. I also think that even if he were being forced to say all this by the Russian government, that doesn't necessarily invalidate the content of his statements. At this point, the Russians are probably much happier and it is much more productive for them to be spreading truth about the NSA rather than falsehoods.
How is he an authority on this particular issue, it seems likely to be beyond his scope?
It was beyond his job scope as a contractor at the NSA, however his own claim about this is that his personal investigation into their poor office network security practices and subsequent hushing from his superiors when he tried to voice legitimate, lawful concerns about this lead him down a path of discovery in which uncovered apparently the vast bulk of the data of their surveillance capabilities within the country as well as abroad, all of which also was kept secret because it was completely illegal. At this point apparently he decided to turn vigilante, and again like above, the NSA's own response in action largely validates the truth of his claims to knowledge of their secrets.
This is all fairly common public knowledge by now. Perhaps you've got him confused with Bradly Manning or Julian Assange?
I've been saying the same thing for months: the key is stored (albeit encrypted itself) in flash, so all you need to do is to back up the flash chip
And everyone else has been saying for months that part of the key is stored in the cpu in a region that is not readable. So all you need to do to back up the key is disassemble the cpu and hope you don't destroy it in the process.
What are the odds that the NSA doesn't have some high-ranking Apple employees on their payroll? Just how secure is Apple's signing key?
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
The ACLU misses one point:
The FBI does not know if the erase feature is enabled. The court should force them to run through the desoldering routine at least once to figure out if maybe they don't even need Apple to disable this feature.
That they didn't try, that they go to court without being sure, tells the whole story. If this were about breaking into the phone, they would have tried this, in the time that has passed with court cases they would already be sure if they need Apple at all or not, and if it turns out that not, they probably would have already broken into the phone.
ACLU is right, but they still miss just how malicious the FBI is.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
No, you're wrong. The NSA is a DoD office and *in theory* bound by posse comitatus and cannot be used for domestic purposes. The head of the NSA is always a commissioned general officer.
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
What makes folks think he's privy to this information or knows their full capacity?
What makes everyone believe he's telling us this of his own volition?
How is he an authority on this particular issue, it seems likely to be beyond his scope?
We can read.
This isn't really coming from Snowden, he just happened to be a high profile person who tweeted about it. His statement is based on legal filings by the ACLU and others who point out methods that the FBI could use to crack the PIN code on their own.
For example, they could back up the flash memory, make 10 attempts, the phone wipes it and they restore it and try the next 10 numbers. The link is right in the summary.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
The NSA is supposed to deal with foreign intelligence only. The FBI is supposed to deal with domestic criminal investigations only.
That's how it was back in the 70s, but this is no longer true, and hasn't been for decades.
This is also a domestic terrorism case with no evidence that there is any foreign involvement...
Unless you're part of the investigating team, you're comment is complete conjecture. You don't know what evidence they have.
Just another day in Paradise
Posse comitatus was a Congressional act, and you can see in the text below "except in cases..." Congress also passed some other acts...FISA and Patriot come to mind...that have changed the rules. So, the "theory" has been OBE for a while.
Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.
Just another day in Paradise
In spite of his god-like status among some of you, Mr. Snowden wouldn't know what capabilities the FBI has or doesn't have. He didn't work there, and he wouldn't have had a need to know, so he would never have been briefed on such. But, let's not let that get in the way of the Snowden gospel.
Just another day in Paradise
Not on the iPhone 5C, the key is kept in flash memory. The CPU doesn't have a secure memory for keys, only a factory set secret that can only be read by signed, privileged code.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC