The Patriot Post® · Apple Wins a Court Case, but Encryption Legislation Needed

On Monday, U.S. Magistrate Judge James Orenstein ruled that the FBI cannot force Apple to create software that could crack the encryption on an iPhone. No, this isn’t the famous case where a judge in California ordered Apple to assist in accessing the phone belonging to Syed Farook, the terrorist in the San Bernardino shooting. In this case, the FBI asked to access a phone belonging to a New York City drug dealer and Judge Orenstein said Apple did not have to assist the government against its will. The ruling doesn’t directly affect the San Bernardino iPhone, but it does lend wait to Apple’s arguments.

This is not the end of the legal road. Instead this question over technology, encryption and due process will have to be decided by Congress. Indeed, it has already created a commission that will study the issue of encryption and law enforcement. National security fellow at the Brookings Institution Susan Hennessey told The Daily Signal, “It’s an issue dealing with competing core fundamental American notions about what civil liberties look like, and what we want our relations with law enforcement to look like. When we run into those values’ concerns, which tend to be hard to resolve, our collective understanding of how our governing system functions is that the proper way to fix that is through our elected representatives passing legislation.” Why would we leave such an important question in the hands of appointed judges that could so swiftly give up our Liberty?