National insecurity extortion

Last week we saw the federal goons try to take a bite out of Apple for not voluntarily cooperating with demands for its corporate product secrets which would put millions of its loyal customers in jeopardy.

Apple is rightly pushing back. So now the Justice Department has filed a motion in federal court to compel Apple to provide “reasonable technical assistance” in the government’s investigation of the locked iPhone belonging to Syed Farook, the San Bernardino gunman terrorist.

"Apple has attempted to design and market its products to allow technology, rather than the law, to control access to data which has been found by this Court to be warranted for an important investigation. Despite its efforts, Apple nonetheless retains the technical ability to comply with the order, and so should be required to obey it," say the goons. 

First, understand that Apple is totally innocent of any crime, has committed no wrongdoing whatsoever, and had nothing to do with Farook’s terrorist act. Never-mind all that scream the feds; they demand in the name of “national security” that Apple help them unlock his iPhone.

This is nothing more than a show of government national insecurity extortion.

Where in the United States Constitution does the government enjoy the authority to extort a person or corporation to employ technology to design products which will “help” it in its criminal investigations – in this instance to create a “backdoor” to unlock data stored on its iPhnes? Nowhere!

To the contrary, the Thirteenth Amendment plainly prohibits slavery or involuntary servitude anywhere in the United States, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.

"No matter how you slice this pie, if the government succeeds in getting this back door, it will eventually get a back door into all encryption, and our world, as we know it, is over… In spite of the FBI's claim that it would protect the back door, we all know that's impossible. There are bad apples everywhere, and there only needs to be one in the US government. Then a few million dollars, some beautiful women (or men), and a yacht trip to the Caribbean might be all it takes for our enemies to have full access to our secrets," explains famed anti-virus software maker, John McAfee.

McAfee says that the FBI's demand, coupled with the corresponding court order, marks the "end of the US as a world power."  He’s offered to decrypt the terrorist's iPhone free of charge, explaining that he works with the best hackers in the business. Working together relying primarily upon social engineering techniques, they would be able to break iPhone encryption in just three weeks.

"I would eat my shoe on the Neil Cavuto show if we could not break the encryption on the San Bernardino phone. This is a pure and simple fact… So here is my offer to the FBI. I will, free of charge, decrypt the information on the San Bernardino phone, with my team. We will primarily use social engineering, and it will take us three weeks. If you accept my offer, then you will not need to ask Apple to place a back door in its product, which will be the beginning of the end of America."

So you see that the government goons need not resort to extortion and force against Apple and its loyal customers -- wholly innocent parties in this case -- to get what they want in their investigation – the encrypted information of a terrorist’s iPhone. But the government goons are used to getting what they’re after by force. To the goons it’s a matter of national insecurity rather than national security.

The goons would rather use national insecurity extortion.