[MatthewWilkes]

Crucially, anyone with sufficient technical skill can open a safe, therefore the manufacturer offering that service isn't a violation of customer rights.

Nobody can bypass the security on an iPhone but Apple, requiring them to do so isn't requiring a company to assist in a search, it's requiring a company to use its unique position as the manufacturer to damage their product.

[evgen]

And if I built a physical safe that was so complex that only I could safely open it and then sold the safe to an alleged criminal, would the court have the power to force me to reveal the secret to opening this safe? Sorry, but the law is not exactly on our side here. The courts have legitimately exercised such warrants before and will do so again, as is their right and authority.

Unfortunately, I think this sort of example paints you into a corner. The court is not requiring the company to permenantly damage the product, any more than a locksmith who opens a locked door to assist in the execution of a warrant is damaging the door. Once the court has what it requests it is trivial to reinstall the original firmware.

There is an old saying that hard cases make bad law. This is a hard case. The defendants are both heinous and deceased; they lack standing to resist and few will support such an effort. Apple is a third-party here and is on such shakey legal ground that they are left defending themselves in the court of public opinion because they know they are going to lose in an actual court. Bad things tend to come out of situations like this.

[michaelmrose]

Going with the safe analogy given reasonable suspicion and a court order its clearly within the governments powers to say drill the safe, it MIGHT be in the governments power to force the individual to open it depending on how they see it. It is hard to see how a 3rd party not involved in the crime ought to be compelled to work on the governments behalf just because they happen to have made the original safe and possess the know how to break into it.

Can you explain how that duty comes to be?

[evgen]

Because not stepping up when asked to perform such a task opens you to obstruction of justice charges. Is a building super somehow not compelled to open a door in a building if they have the key and the agents of the government present a valid warrant? When they have a warrant you do not get to decide if you think what they ask for is justified, that ship has sailed already. You get the choice of do as asked, or potentially go to jail while your legal team tries to have the warrant quashed or at least your involvement in same. Best of luck on that...

And since you asked, I would bet that most of the people sitting on a jury deciding if you go to jail or not for impeding the execution of the warrant probably think that your duty to act in such a situation is considered a part of the price of admission to civil society.