Apple has matched the Department of Justice’s recent vitriol, by this week calling the FBI’s request for code to help it unlock Syed Farook’s iPhone unconstitutional. Furthermore, Apple in a court filing this week again challenged the validity of the government’s use of the All Writs Act of 1789 as justification in compelling Apple to...

The National Security Agency’s silence in the Apple-FBI story is probably not so surprising. But that hasn’t stopped people from dragging the NSA’s name into the conversation. The latest to do so is Richard Clarke, former counterterrorism chair under presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Clarke appeared on NPR with David Greene and said...

If a report from this weekend’s New York Times is to be believed, the popular instant messaging platform WhatsApp may be the next technology company to find itself in the crosshairs of the Department of Justice and its war on crypto. Government officials are reportedly torn on how to proceed with a wiretap that a...

Threatpost Editor Mike Mimoso talks to Synack director of research and well-known OS X hacker Patrick Wardle about the discovery of an OS X malware dropper that likely was developed by the Hacking Team. [embedded content]

Mike Mimoso and Chris Brook discuss the week in news, including how Amazon is backtracking on encryption when it comes to their devices, a new set of alleged passcode bypasses for iOS, and the new OS X ransomware KeRanger. Download: Threatpost_News_Wrap_March_11_2016.mp3 Music by Chris Gonsalves

The Justice Department took off the gloves in its latest volley against Apple and its refusal to comply with a court order to unlock a terrorist’s iPhone. “Apple deliberately raised technological barriers that now stand between a lawful warrant and an iPhone containing evidence related to the terrorist mass murder of 14 Americans,” wrote attorneys...

Apple’s head of software engineering told law enforcement and the government via a Washington Post op-ed on Sunday that a precedent-setting backdoor into the iPhone threatens to turn back the clock on mobile security to less safe times. The column, written by Craig Federighi and posted last night, argues that the removal of security features...

Apple has yet to patch a series of bypass vulnerabilities in iOS that could enable an attacker to sidestep the passcode authorization screen on iPhones and iPads running iOS 9.0, 9.1, and the most recent build of the mobile operating system, 9.2.1. Like all passcode bypass bugs, an attacker would have to have the device in...

Mike Mimoso and Chris Brook recap RSA 2016, including how pervasive the FBI vs. Apple debate has been around the conference, OpenSSL two years after Heartbleed, and why hacking back is always a bad idea. Download: Threatpost_News_Wrap_March_4_2016.mp3 Music by Chris Gonsalves

SAN FRANCISCO—A laundry list of past and present iPhone experts and cryptography experts today filed an amicus brief asking the courts to vacate their order mandating Apple assist the FBI in unlocking a phone belonging to San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook. Filed by Jennifer Granick and Riana Pfefferkorn of the Stanford Law School Center for...