“Apple’s lawyers indicated yesterday that they plan to use a First Amendment defense in the San Bernardino iPhone case, arguing that if code is speech, then the government is compelling the company to say something it doesn’t want to by forcing it to cooperate in cracking the phone’s password,” Kim Zetter reports for Wired. “But, as Motherboard previously pointed out, experts say the company might actually be onto something.”
“A famous encryption case known as Bernstein v. US Department of Justice established long ago that code is speech and is protected by the First Amendment,” Zetter reports. “Compelling Apple to write code would be the equivalent of the government compelling Apple’s speech. But that’s not the most important argument in this case. Instead, it’s the digital signature that Apple would use to sign that code that is the key to Apple’s First Amendment argument, say legal experts who spoke with WIRED.”
Zetter reports, “‘The human equivalent of the company signing code is basically saying, ‘We believe that this code is safe for you to run,” says Jennifer Granick, director of civil liberties for the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School. ‘So I think that when you force Apple to cryptographically sign the software, it has a communicative aspect to it that I think is compelled speech to force them to do it.'”
Much more in the full article – recommended – here.
MacDailyNews Take: All of this court action will ultimately serve to help inform Congress to write new law(s) for modern times.
SEE ALSO:
FBI chief acknowledges Apple case may set privacy precedent – February 25, 2016
Gruber: The next step in iPhone impregnability – February 25, 2016
U.S. government sought data from 15 Apple devices in last four months – February 25, 2016
Apple CEO Tim Cook says iPhone-cracking software the ‘equivalent of cancer’ – February 24, 2016
Apple’s fight with U.S. could speed development of devices impervious to government intrusion – February 24, 2016
Apple to argue that FBI court order violates its free-speech rights – February 24, 2016
Apple, the U.S. government, and security – February 24, 2016
Congressman Ted Lieu asks FBI to drop demand that Apple hack iPhones – February 23, 2016
In the fight to hack iPhones, the U.S. government has more to lose than Apple – February 23, 2016
Here are the 12 other cases where the U.S. government has demanded Apple help it hack into iPhones – February 23, 2016
John McAfee blasts FBI for ‘illiterate’ order to create Apple iPhone backdoor – February 23, 2016
U.S. government seeks to force Apple to extract data from a dozen more iPhones – February 23, 2016
Apple CEO Cook: They’d have to cart us out in a box before we’d create a backdoor – February 22, 2016
Tim Cook’s memo to Apple employees: ‘This case is about more than a single phone’ – February 22, 2016
Obama administration: We’re only demanding Apple hack just one iPhone – February 17, 2016