Apple has put itself in a unique spot in the industry, continuously selling its brand as privacy-focused. In most cases, that is true, but not always.
In public, the company has even fought with the FBI when requested to unlock iPhones’ that have been found in vital criminal cases and would provide crucial evidence to the court case or on-going investigation.
But, well, things have not been the same under the radar, according to a report from Reuters, who spoke to six sources familiar with the matter.
“Outside of that public spat over San Bernardino, Apple gets along with the federal government,” said a former FBI employee.
In a new exclusive report from Reuters, Apple dropped its plans to encrypt iCloud backups after the FBI protested on the move. Encrypting iCloud backups could mean that even Apple itself could not be able to access the readable data stored in a customers’ cloud storage.
Thus if cloud encryption had been implemented, Apple would not be able to submit any readable data when requested by the authorities. That would make the FBI’s work even harder when it comes to accessing iCloud’s backup data, so they tabled their arguments on why the plan should not be implemented and Apple listened.
The main point of argument was that iCloud data has been very fundamental for the FBI while solving cases against subjects using iPhones. Apple saw some sense in this and was convinced to drop the plans.
“Legal killed it, for reasons you can imagine,” said a former Apple employee to Reuters.
However, it is not yet known what the main reason behind the plan was. According to Reuters, they could not establish the main reason, but dropping plans to encrypt iCloud seems like a pretty good candidate.
