The FBI could be heading for another legal showdown with Apple over gaining access to the iPhone of a dead terror suspect, after admitting it has a device belonging to Dahir Adan, who stabbed 10 people in a Minnesota mall in September.
FBI special agent Rich Thorton told reporters at a press conference late last week that the Feds have the device and that it’s locked with a passcode, but didn’t reveal what model it is.
That will determine what options are open to investigators. If it’s running iOS 8 and above, for example, it will be locked and encrypted so that even Apple can’t help. Brute forcing the code is also unlikely to work because an auto-erase function will wipe all data after 10 incorrect attempts.
“Dahir Adan’s iPhone is locked,” Thornton told reporters, according to Wired. “We are in the process of assessing our legal and technical options to gain access to this device and the data it may contain.” – READ MORE
