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Cops Are Now Opening iPhones With Dead People's Fingerprints (forbes.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: In November 2016, around seven hours after Abdul Razak Ali Artan had mowed down a group of people in his car, gone on a stabbing spree with a butcher's knife and been shot dead by a police officer on the grounds of Ohio State University, an FBI agent applied the bloodied body's index finger to the iPhone found on the deceased. The cops hoped it would help them access the Apple device to learn more about the assailant's motives and Artan himself.
This is according to FBI forensics specialist Bob Moledor, who detailed for Forbes the first known case of police using a deceased person's fingerprints in an attempt to get past the protections of Apple's Touch ID technology. Unfortunately for the FBI, Artan's lifeless fingerprint didn't unlock the device. In the hours between his death and the attempt to unlock, when the feds had to go through legal processes regarding access to the smartphone, the iPhone had gone to sleep and when reopened required a passcode, Moledor said. He sent the device to a forensics lab which managed to retrieve information from the iPhone, the FBI phone expert and a Columbus officer who worked the case confirmed. That data helped the authorities determine that Artan's failed attempt to murder innocents may have been a result of ISIS-inspired radicalization.
Where Moledor's attempt failed, others have succeeded. Separate sources close to local and federal police investigations in New York and Ohio, who asked to remain anonymous as they weren't authorized to speak on record, said it was now relatively common for fingerprints of the deceased to be depressed on the scanner of Apple iPhones, devices which have been wrapped up in increasingly powerful encryption over recent years. For instance, the technique has been used in overdose cases, said one source. In such instances, the victim's phone could contain information leading directly to the dealer.
This is according to FBI forensics specialist Bob Moledor, who detailed for Forbes the first known case of police using a deceased person's fingerprints in an attempt to get past the protections of Apple's Touch ID technology. Unfortunately for the FBI, Artan's lifeless fingerprint didn't unlock the device. In the hours between his death and the attempt to unlock, when the feds had to go through legal processes regarding access to the smartphone, the iPhone had gone to sleep and when reopened required a passcode, Moledor said. He sent the device to a forensics lab which managed to retrieve information from the iPhone, the FBI phone expert and a Columbus officer who worked the case confirmed. That data helped the authorities determine that Artan's failed attempt to murder innocents may have been a result of ISIS-inspired radicalization.
Where Moledor's attempt failed, others have succeeded. Separate sources close to local and federal police investigations in New York and Ohio, who asked to remain anonymous as they weren't authorized to speak on record, said it was now relatively common for fingerprints of the deceased to be depressed on the scanner of Apple iPhones, devices which have been wrapped up in increasingly powerful encryption over recent years. For instance, the technique has been used in overdose cases, said one source. In such instances, the victim's phone could contain information leading directly to the dealer.
Trigger happy cops will now be happier. The dead will not resist that caps use its fingerprints to unlock their phone... :(
Proof gathered this way should be invalidated or else cops will be more inclined to kill the suspects to access more easily their phones
Dude. No. No cop I've ever known would kill a drug user just to get a line on the dealer. Climb out of the youtube-hate.
A simple mask wouldn't work either, you appear to know nothing about FaceiD or technology. Oh you poor Apple Haters!
The mask (singular) you read about unlocking an iPhone X? It was rather complex, requiring a full 3D scan, IR photos of the area round the eyes placed exactly right, which also require a living subject to capture... how are you going to get that photo after they are dead? Your "point" in the end is just more Hater bullshit, pointless in relation to the current article and doing more to highlight your own ignorance and ineptness than relevancy.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Body dead too long? Too bad. Get a warrant.
Druggie too stoned to give consent? Get a warrant.
Want to access my phone FOR ANY REASON? Get a fucking WARRANT.
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
Police have had a solution to that one for years. It's why the 'no knock' warrant exists - they just need to convince a judge there is reason to believe the suspect will destroy evidence if given the opportunity.
If the police believe you have evidence at your home or on your person, they will get a warrant to search you. But if they believe the evidence is easily destroyed - a phone you can lock, or documents you can burn - then they will break into your home while you are at work. Or smash the door down and force everyone to the floor at gunpoint. Or you'll be walking down the street one moment, and the next two plainclothes officers have snuck up behind you and are pinning you against the wall while they get the cuffs on.
Recall the Dread Pirate Roberts arrest? Police knew his laptop would lock if he closed the lid, so they had to arrest him while he had it open. They used an officer posing as a waitress to get close enough without arousing suspicion, who pinned him to the floor while another ran in to grab the laptop.
This isn't something new. The legal system had had solutions for many years to address the problem of suspects who may destroy evidence if they know they are about to be arrested.