WASHINGTON – Apple’s chief executive Tim Cook is such a respected figure that it’s easy to overlook the basic problem with his argument about encryption: Cook is asserting that a private company and the interests of its customers should prevail over the public’s interest as expressed by our courts.
The San Bernardino encryption case was the wrong one to fight. Apple doubled-down Thursday by asking a federal court to vacate its order that the company create a tool to unlock the iPhone of shooter Syed Rizwan Farook. But if a higher court ultimately requires Apple to do that, as seems likely, the company will be seen by privacy advocates at home and abroad as having been rolled by the U.S. government. Foreign governments may demand similar treatment. Neither outcome is in Apple’s interest.
Cook’s stand has added to his luster as a tech hero. But the case, unfortunately, could be a lose-lose for U.S. technology companies, eroding both privacy protections and global market share.
Cook’s Feb. 16 “Message to Our Customers” was somewhere between a civics lesson and a sales pitch. “Smartphones, led by iPhone, have become an essential part of our lives,” Cook began. He said he wanted to protect Apple users from what he claimed was an FBI “backdoor” that “would undermine the very freedoms and liberty our government is meant to protect.”
The Justice Department reacted indignantly. “Apple has attempted to design and market its products to allow technology, rather than the law, to control access to data,” the government argued in a Feb. 19 motion.