‘We heard you say you’re worried about the government listening to your phone calls so we called to tell you not to worry . . . yet.’
The murderous Moslems who offed some 14 innocent folk in San Bernardino left a cell phone that the FBI says might be full of evidence. But said FBI is somehow too dumb to crack the phone’s Apple cryptography. Cell phone data is encrypted so that it can be used to pay for purchases without that payment being stolen and so that private data used by businesses aren’t stolen either, to mention two of the reasons for such protection.
Apple, wanting to continue selling cell phones, refused to hand the FBI the key to that encryption. The Feds sued, obtaining a court order forcing Apple to provide its key. Apple,aware of the need of its customers for security, refused.
Meanwhile a Government memo leaked; a memo revealing that the government wants to listen in on any call that it chooses. The FBI ‘s court order is being ignored by Apple with wide industry support and The argument rages on; what are we to think?
As usual with us, we can’t tell you what to think but we can tell you what we think. For once, it is simple.
Much of the media is spinning this as a churlish refusal by Apple to help nail the bad guys, the San Bernardino Moslem murderers. That is not the case, those two are dead. It is rather an attempt to gain access to all Apple cell phones for government snoops. Decide for yourself how long the apple security features of your iphone will remain secure after government agents have access to that.
The FBI is demanding that Apple build a ‘back door’ into its phones, a ‘secret’ passage allowing government to overhear phone calls at will. How long would you bet that only government would know how to open that back door? Right.
Polls seem to show that as of now, most folk think Apple is a jerk, denying government power to nab the bad guys. The media appear mostly to be presenting things that way. Not too many of us remember how things were back in the days of party lines, when one cable pair served two or four telephones in rural areas. When you picked up the phone, you immediately overhear any conversation taking place with any of the other parties on your shared line. Nothing over the phone was confidential. Now, the government wants to share every line at will; no one is talking about due process in this.
So the government and much of the media are playing us. We think this is police state stuff and anti-business besides. We favor telling our Congressfolk so. That’s our opinion; you are entitled to yours …
