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from the something-you-have,-something-you-are,-something-you-know dept.
FBI is quietly waging a different encryption battle in a Los Angeles courtroom. The authorities obtained a search warrant compelling the girlfriend of an alleged Armenian gang member to press her finger against an iPhone that had been seized from a Glendale home. The phone uses Apple's fingerprint identification system for unlocking. It's a rare case were prosecutors have demanded a person provide a fingerprint to unlock a computer, but experts expect such cases to become more common.
In a Circuit Court decision in Virginia 2014, the judge ruled that a criminal defendant cannot use Fifth Amendment protections to safeguard a phone that is locked using his or her fingerprint. According to Judge Steven C. Fucci, a criminal defendant can't be compelled to hand over a passcode to police officers for the purpose of unlocking a cellular device, law enforcement officials can compel a defendant to give up a fingerprint. The Fifth Amendment states that "no person shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself," which protects memorized information like passwords and passcodes, but it doesn't protect fingerprints in the eyes of the law. Frucci said that "giving police a fingerprint is akin to providing a DNA or handwriting sample or an actual key, which the law permits. A passcode, though, requires the defendant to divulge knowledge, which the law protects against.
In other words fingerprints are bad security. On the other hand... maybe some fingers like 9 out of 10, instead can trigger a silent self-destruct?
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Tuesday May 03 2016, @06:43AM
Sounds like you are onto something there. Also, a password that will wipe all your shit would be cool too.
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 03 2016, @10:35AM
Destruction of evidence is never good. Stubbing a cigarette out onto your unlock finger seems to be a valid way of sticking up your middle finger to the man, though.
I'm no expert, but I believe the spirit of the 5th supports the right to not unlock your phone under duress, and any judge who says otherwise is a fascist cnut.
(Score: 2) by linuxrocks123 on Tuesday May 03 2016, @09:15PM
Let's please keep the discussion level higher than this: http://linuxrocks123.livejournal.com/96682.html [livejournal.com]
Your statement is incorrect. The 5th Amendment protects testimony. Your fingerprint, DNA, blood, handwriting samples, and similar such things have been consistently ruled not to be testimony. They can be compelled with a warrant.
Now: producing documents that the government doesn't know for a fact exist, or doesn't know are authentic, is testimony. So, compelling entering or revealing passwords does implicate the 5th Amendment, according to most courts that have looked at the issue. Some, like the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, have tried to compel suspects anyway with a gross misapplication of the "foregone conclusion" exception to the 5th Amendment, probably because the suspects were suspected to have child porn, and children make people stupidly emotional. But the 11th Circuit ruled correctly, and I think the Supreme Court of the US would do so as well.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Tuesday May 03 2016, @09:57PM
"Certainly, your honor, this appears to be in order. Which finger would you like for me to apply to the scanner?
Now it's back to something you know (which fingerprint out of 10 won't destroy the data) rather than something you have.
(Score: 2) by Nollij on Wednesday May 04 2016, @03:17AM
If such a move is even possible, your lawyers should have the easiest victory of their careers. It would mean the prosecution has nothing in place to preserve evidence, and thus has no evidence to use in court.
Look into how forensic data is gathered from traditional desktop hard drives - the are cloned on equipment that is (effectively) physically incapable of writing to the original, and all data is then gathered from these copies, typically in a fashion that's also read-only.