FBI 'deeply concerned' about Apple's new security protections

The FBI says that Apple increasing security features on iPhone "hinders" the agency's ability to protect Americans, and again presses for backdoor access.

Apple's newly-announced security plans include increasing end to end encryption for almost all iCloud services. This, plus iMessage identity verification and two-factor authentication of Apple IDs using hardware keys, will roll out globally during 2023.

Speaking for the US, the FBI told the Washington Post that it was "deeply concerned with the threat end-to-end and user-only-access encryption pose."

"This hinders our ability to protect the American people from criminal acts ranging from cyber-attacks and violence against children to drug trafficking, organized crime and terrorism," an FBI spokesperson told the publication. "In this age of cybersecurity and demands for 'security by design,' the FBI and law enforcement partners need 'lawful access by design.'"

"Lawful access by design" is a euphemism for access to otherwise encrypted data. The FBI and others have continually pressed Apple to add a way for law enforcement to see all data, and Apple has refused.

It is not possible to add a backdoor that only law enforcement can use. Any backdoor, any circumvention of encryption, effectively cancels all user privacy protection because bad actors will exploit it.