The leaders of tech companies such as Google, Facebook Inc., Microsoft Corporation, AT&T and more than two dozen other corporations are showing their support for Apple regarding their fight against the FBI. These companies have filed legal briefs on Thursday, asking a judge to support Apple with their bid not to follow the court order to help in unlocking one of the San Bernardino shooters' iPhone.
The allies of Apple filed the amicus briefs to United States District Judge Sheri Pym in Riverside, California. However, six relatives of the victims of the San Bernardino attack submitted their own amicus brief opposing Apple. Three California law enforcement groups, three federal law enforcement groups and the San Bernardino district attorney have also filed in favor of the government.
Other companies including Twitter and LinkedIn Corp. asserted that the Congress has passed laws that establish things that companies could do for the government. The tech companies also noted that the Congress passed the All Writs Act more than 200 years ago. They pointed out that the government forcing engineers to disable security protections rely only on a boundless interpretation of the law. However, the families of the victims argued that the government had a valid warrant, Reuters reported.
Privacy advocacy groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union, Access Now, and the Wickr foundation have also filed briefs in support of Apple, The Economic Times reported.
The battle of Apple against the FBI has become public last month. The FBI was requesting via a court order that Apple should write new software in order to disable the passcode protection for the iPhone owned by Syed Rizwan Farook. Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, have killed 14 people and injured 22 after they open fired at an establishment in San Bernardino.
The FBI has issued the order as they do not want to erase other data, which they deem to be important. Apple's iPhones and other products are designed to delete data once the passcode entered is incorrect for the tenth time.
NDTV also reported that Apple has argued this will be posing a dangerous precedent and threaten their customers' security. They asked the order to be dismissed but earlier this week, Apple's representative and FBI's director have presented their arguments before a congressional panel.
Earlier this week, a similar case has found Apple on the winning side after a federal judge in Brooklyn ruled that the government overstepped their authority. Law enforcement officials were seeking similar assistance as the FBI regarding an Apple iPhone used in a drug case.
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