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posted by takyon on Monday October 23 2017, @10:10PM   Printer-friendly
from the world's-tiniest-violin-ringtone dept.

FBI failed to access 7,000 encrypted mobile devices

Agents at the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have been unable to extract data from nearly 7,000 mobile devices they have tried to access, the agency's director has said.

Christopher Wray said encryption on devices was "a huge, huge problem" for FBI investigations. The agency had failed to access more than half of the devices it targeted in an 11-month period, he said.

One cyber-security expert said such encryption was now a "fact of life". Many smartphones encrypt their contents when locked, as standard - a security feature that often prevents even the phones' manufacturers from accessing data. Such encryption is different to end-to-end encryption, which prevents interception of communications on a large scale.

Cyber-security expert Prof Alan Woodward at the University of Surrey said device encryption was clearly frustrating criminal investigations but it would be impractical and insecure to develop "back doors" or weakened security.

In a time when the government is committing criminal acts, is it not advisable for citizens to do what they can to protect themselves from that crime?


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by MrGuy on Monday October 23 2017, @11:09PM (3 children)

    by MrGuy (1007) on Monday October 23 2017, @11:09PM (#586633)

    Agents at the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have been unable to extract data from nearly 7,000 mobile devices they have tried to access, the agency's director has said.
    Christopher Wray said encryption on devices was "a huge, huge problem" for FBI investigations. The agency had failed to access more than half of the devices it targeted in an 11-month period, he said.

    Note how carefully this is worded. The 7,000 number is the number of devices the FBI tried to access.

    Where is the number for the devices where there was reasonable suspicion that a search of the device would yield meaningful evidence of a crime?
    Where is the number for the devices where there was reasonable suspicion that a search of the device would yield meaningful evidence of the SPECIFIC crime being investigated?
    Where is the number for the devices for which a search warrant was obtained?

    It's in the FBI's interest to inflate as much as possible the number of devices that it "targeted."

    There's a world of difference between "we picked this guy up on an outstanding federal warrant, and we wanted to take a look at his phone just in case he said or texted something incriminating" and "we know this particular phone was used to communicate with a hitman about a murder for hire, and we need to look at the call history to help us identify the suspect." One is a completely speculative reason to look at the phone, one is a search with probable cause.

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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by bob_super on Monday October 23 2017, @11:11PM

    by bob_super (1357) on Monday October 23 2017, @11:11PM (#586636)

    > The agency had failed to access more than half of the devices it targeted in an 11-month period

    Note that this implies that thousands of devices were successfully targeted...

  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday October 24 2017, @02:54PM

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 24 2017, @02:54PM (#586885) Journal

    You know what the next step will be?

    Management Engines.

    Hey, it worked on Intel and AMD processors used in billions of desktop, laptop and server PCs. Compromise baked right into your microprocessor. You pay for it. You don't want it. And nobody asked you. One can only speculate why that wasn't listed as a major feature on the box when it was introduced.

    Now the TLAs need to get management engines forced to be in the design of British / Japanese ARM chips. Of course, they only license their IP, as I understand it. Others take the IP, design their own concrete chip implementations, and then fabricate their chips. So it might be just a wee bit harder to forcibly corrupt the hardware.

    Drat! those two billion smartphones with ARM chips!

    --
    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 24 2017, @04:59PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 24 2017, @04:59PM (#586936)

    No, it's not. Examining your quote even carefullier:

    (FBI) have been unable to extract data from nearly 7,000 mobile devices they have tried to access, [..] more than half of the devices it targeted

    That implies to me that they have tried to access 14,000 devices, half of which they were able to access succesfully. That still doesn't say how much of those were lawful targetings, but it's still twice as much as you assumed.