[csandreasen]

I think the big issue here isn't that Apple is now encrypting iPhones. In general, being able to secure the data on your phone is a huge benefit for the average consumer. People lose their phones all of the time, and you have no idea who is going to find your lost phone and what they're going to do with the data on it. Given the amount of sensitive data people throw on their phones without thinking, Apple is probably doing more to prevent petty crime and identify theft by encrypting the data on iPhones.

The big issue as I see it, though, is that Apple isn't advertising this as a means of protecting yourself from criminals. Instead, they advertised it as a means of preventing Apple from complying with warrants. Warrants constitute an violation of a person's privacy which is explicitly allowed in the constitution. There's a good reason we have them, and a process that's been in place for a few centuries to limit their abuse. More often than not, the bad guy is not the federal government, and the public is served by allowing the police to investigate specific individuals under reasonable suspicion with specific limitations as authorized by the courts. If people have a problem with the way warrants are issued or how the police carry out investigations, they should seek to change that process, not try to circumvent them.

This isn't going to keep out the NSA. It only affects that data physically residing on your phone, and when was the last time the NSA had your phone physically in its possession? This likely isn't going to stop actual law enforcement officials from getting access to the data on your phone. Unless you're typing in a strong password every time you pull your phone out of your pocket, the FBI will likely be able to brute force your phone to gather evidence with little difficulty, providing the courts allow them to do so. On that front, the only thing this has really accomplished is allowing Apple to give the middle finger to the feds in an attempt to appease a customer base who thinks the government is out to get them.

[Zigurd]

If you look at all the links on this thread to the moral panic various cops have been goaded into spewing, it's not like they aren't doing their part to make Apple's point.

[csandreasen]

The cops have a point. I don't think the actual encryption is as big a deal now as people are making it out to be, but Apple is setting a precedent when they say "we're doing this so we don't have to comply with warrants" instead of saying "we're doing this to make our customers safer". Apple just sparked a debate (as much as I hate that term). If the cops don't make a stink out of it now and point out the necessity of warrants, things may likely get out of hand somewhere down the road.

[Zigurd]

A few things about that:

1. Warrants have never been a guarantee of a search producing evidence.

2. It isn't Apple's data to hand over when a warrant is presented.

3. Making strong and deniable encryption illegal for some classes of users will make it highly desirable contraband.

4. Producing cyphertext complies with a warrant if that is all you can access.