[acqq]

They still have to develop the different version of the software even if it's just changing some specific statements and recompiling and then signing. Not to mention that it also has to be tested, installed, access controlled etc. So it actually has to be built, tested and protected. What do they "outright lie" can you please quote?

> The world isn't somehow different once that software exists

It is, if it's made by Apple now, since it makes the legal precedent in how All Writs is accepted by Apple to be used. It even makes it a precedent for other companies too. That's why they question it and rightly so.

That's why if FBI or you would have managed to produce some cracking tool now, without Apple's help, it wouldn't matter. It wouldn't affect the development of even more secure phones by Apple.

Technically-hard-or-not-hard, as claimed by an-intern-or-the-Cydia-author is, once again, irrelevant.

> what is fundamentally different is only that people realize the government might be able to force Apple to use their key.

Government already tried to force them and Cook responded, literally: "We feel the best way forward would be for the government to withdraw its demands under the All Writs Act" so people hopefully already realize what is at stake and at least we discuss it.