by Dan Moren
Law enforcement circling a dozen more iPhone unlocking cases
The Wall Street Journal reports that the San Bernardino iPhone is not, in fact, the only one the government wants Apple to unlock:
The dozen other phones now the subject of legal battles were seized in a variety of criminal investigations, but they are not terrorism cases like the San Bernardino investigation, people familiar with the matter said.
The dozen or so cases are also distinct from San Bernardino in that many of them involve phones using an older Apple operating system, which has fewer security barriers to surmount, these people said.
Another wrinkle in this ongoing saga. It is telling that some of those phones use older versions of iOS–pre-iOS 8, remember, the devices were not encrypted, and Apple did comply with orders to unlock devices.
But it does also paint the picture that the government’s concern is not merely a single iPhone, but many different iPhones. And that’s where the worry over privacy and government intrusion come in.