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Just One Issue Matters in the Clash Between Apple and the FBI

March 2, 2016

February 24, 2016

By CHISTOPHER MIMS

Dow Jones Business News

The debate over whether Apple Inc. should help the Justice Department unlock the phone of San Bernardino attacker Syed Rizwan Farook has gotten bogged down in technical details over the scope of the government's request, the handling of the phone in the days after the deadly mass shooting and the distinction between a passcode and an encryption strategy.

That's all a distraction. It's also dangerous for the future of personal privacy and, if you believe in it, the functioning of our democracy.

To be sure, how Apple would "unlock" this and future iPhones matters very much to its chief executive, Tim Cook, who might be forced to ask his most talented security experts to create a way into the iPhone's increasingly elaborate cybersecurity fortress. It matters to the FBI only inasmuch as it affects the agency's ability to win the case.

And it matters not at all to everyday users, who should be reminded that the question at hand is simply this: Do we want our government, and the governments of countless other countries, to have the ability to compel Apple--or any other technology company--to grant access to any of our data they request?

Focusing the debate on this point highlights scenarios like those outlined by Rep. Ted Lieu, a California Democrat who wrote in a letter supporting Apple that, "This FBI court order, by compelling a private-sector company to write new software, is essentially making that company an arm of law enforcement."

Christopher Soghoian, principal technologist at the American Civil Liberties Union, echoes Mr. Lieu's concerns. If the government wins, he says, it will have the authority "to deliver surveillance software directly into the computers and cellphones of Americans everywhere."

"This doesn't just apply to laptops and cellphones," he adds. "With the Internet of Things we're inviting a large numbers of companies into our homes to place cameras and microphones into our bedrooms and children's rooms, and any of those companies could be asked to turn those on."

A more sophisticated tracking and spying device than the smartphone you carry in your pocket every day has never been invented. Do we want a legal precedent that can transform the "Internet of Things" into an " Internet of Surveillance"?

In this debate, how the citizens of Apple's home country weigh this possibility against the needs of law- enforcement authorities has implications not just for us, but for everyone on Earth. It is the only question that matters.