“On Monday, French Socialist MP Yann Galut proposed an amendment to French law that – if passed – would see the US companies punished if they didn’t give French officials backdoor access to terrorists’ phones,” The Local reports. “Galut said on Monday that companies like Apple and Google should be fined up to €1 million when they didn’t cooperate in such cases.”
“Galut added that such companies were operating under ‘total bad faith,'” The Local reports. “‘They are hiding behind a supposed privacy protection, but they’re quick to make commercial use of personal data that they’re collecting,’ he said.”
The Local reports, “He stressed that his proposed amendment would not affect the privacy of the common public, only those who are under investigation.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Benjamin Franklin loved the French people, and the French people adored Ben in return.
The should listen to him today:
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. – Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759
SEE ALSO:
Apple CEO Tim Cook can probably defy the US government all he wants and not go to jail – February 29, 2016
Apple CEO Cook picks up where Snowden left off in privacy debate – February 29, 2016
Obama administration set to expand sharing of data that N.S.A. intercepts – February 28, 2016
If Apple loses, your home could be the next thing that’s unlocked: Access to your security cameras would be just a judge order away – February 28, 2016
The Apple vs. FBI fight is about something more basic than software and laws – February 28, 2016
Apple privacy battle with Washington looms as watershed moment – February 26, 2016
Apple’s lawyer: If we lose, it will lead to a ‘police state’ – February 26, 2016
Apple: The law already exists that protects us from U.S. government demands to hack iPhone – February 26, 2016
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “TJ” for the heads up.]
It is just proposed. It probably won’t pass bit if it does, Au Revoir iPhone en France.
Expect Apple to implement the passcode delay and try-limit into the secure enclave hardware in iPhone 7 or 7S.
Then there will be no way for Apple or anyone else to use software to unlock a phone without the passcode.
Apple leaked their research plans deliberately in order to weaken the FBI’s future position. Apple may well end up complying with the FBI’s current, outrageous request to build a back door, should the courts join such calumny. But a future generation iPhone would be impervious to such hacks. Can the Government forbid such research and development? I think not—that would amount to an outright rape of the Bill of Rights and a rejection of the concept of liberty that informs the entire Constitution.
I’m not sure Apple will say bye to France, but I would be surprised if France’s iPhones don’t see a price bump courtesy idiotic French politicians!
Apple could just make a special model for France, maybe go for a little flair and call the capability “Cafe Doors”, mostly open, swing both ways, impossible to lock.
Apple can call it Lumiere “I’ve been burned by you before!” iPhone.
Maybe Apple will simply take the iPhone off the market in France if that happens.
So if Google was to follow suit and they both back out of selling phones in France, what phones would the french use?
MS or BlackBerry?
Hey, good luck with that. Blahahahaha
If this proposed law had a chance of passing, I strongly suggest French citizens would create a backlash to kill it. The similarly stupid law proposals in New York State and California have had severe citizen backlash. I expect those law proposals to go nowhere.
Wait, the French cowering in fear, ready and willing to surrender for nothing but totalitarianism in return? Say it ain’t so.
You know, 2014, you are a dick with, apparently, zero knowledge of history. It is fair to say that the French were the decisive factor in the Americans winning the Revolutionary War. They volunteered to come help us (yeah, I know, the enemy of my enemy is my friend). Have we repaid them? Yeah, twice, but to sneer at them is just juvenile. Oh, wait, now your comment makes perfect sense…
At the time of the American Revolution, 40% of the American population supported the King and 20% were neutral. Many of these traitors have bread over the years and now hold seats in government. It is no surprise that these deniers of freedom fail to support privacy or the Constitution. It appears France has similar issues with a few unscrupulous descendants of the French Revoloution.
I’ll simply point out that the WWII response to Nazi invasion and takeover was not quite so simplistic. I doubt many French citizens are going to roll over and play dead when it comes to having their privacy extracted from their lives.
Fear tactics at work to prey on the ignorant. Scare, divide and rule…
It’s difficult to see how France could fine Apple. They would have to take issue with the French subsidiary, which is just a sales office and therefore unlikely to possess the expertise to do what is being suggested.
Apple should call their bluff if that law is passed and simply stop selling iPhones there until it is repealed.
From The Comical History of Don Quixote:
You can never trust a Frenchman,
Nor any of their henchmen,
Or Germans or Dutch
Or the Belgians and such,
They’re as bad as lawyers and benchmen.
The grubby Europeans,
Sing their own praise in paeans,
But the Channel is wide
Let them stay on their side,
Where they’ve been for countless aeons.
Their language sounds like twitter,
All lips and teeth and squitter,
Their cheese and their wine
May be all of very fine.
But you can’t beat English bitter.
And French sophistication,
Just gives you constipation,
When they murmur amour
We are all dead sure
They’re the world’s least sexy nation.
So let us raise our glasses,
As England’s glory passes,
To aristocrats
And to middle-class prats,
And the glorious working classes.
The Scotsman has his sporran,
Snug in his Glasgow warren,
And the Welshman’s a lad
And the Irish are mad,
But none of us is foreign.
So praise our bastard nation,
An incredible creation,
Of Latins and Celts
And Saxons that melts
Into pure miscegenation.
And Welcome other races,
With different shades of faces,
Come and join in the song,
Sing it with us so long
As the French stay in their places!
“‘They are hiding behind a supposed privacy protection, but they’re quick to make commercial use of personal data that they’re collecting,”
Even if that were true (which it is for GOOG, but very much less so in AAPL’s case), so what? The users are permitting that commercial use. There’s a world of difference between controlling with whom you wish to share your private information and laying it bare for any government or hacker to do what they wish with it.
Whiny cheese monkeys are just bluffing.
I meant Whiny cheese eating Surrender Monkeys.
Yeh, damn the cowardly French for now wanting to join the super fucked-up disaster wars.
Some socialist….. More like a stalinist.
Does the government have access to FaceBook? If not just buy it from the defense budget and employees ca read everything on it. That would teach the nsa to breach privacy.
The Frenchies joining the pseudo Big Brother paranoia! And earlier the brits! Who’s next!
iPhone is just to good to be sold on planet earth!
It definitly shows that so call freedom is about to vanish…
This proposal has absolutely zero chance of becoming law in France.
Maybe even less than zero.
The French value their digital privacy. Their government knows this.
Apple can close its doors in France if they want to play hardball. Then tax all customers who live in France an unreasonable amount to compensate for the French governments unreasonable penalties.