U.S. officials are examining whether the UK broke a bilateral agreement by reportedly demanding that Apple build a “backdoor” allowing the British government to access backups of data in the company’s encrypted cloud storage systems, reports Reuters.
Last week Apple removed its Advanced Data Protection iCloud feature from the United Kingdom after government demands for backdoor access to encrypted user data, according to Bloomberg. In a very stupid (IMHO) move, on February 7,
The British government has ordered that Apple give it blanket access to all encrypted user content uploaded to the cloud. The Washington Post (a subscription is required to read the article) said the secret order requires blanket access to protected cloud backups around the world and, if implemented, would undermine Apple’s privacy pledge to users,
Customers who are already using Advanced Data Protection, or ADP, will need to manually disable it during an unspecified grace period to keep their iCloud accounts, according to Bloomberg. Apple said it will issue additional guidance in the future to affected users and that it “does not have the ability to automatically disable it on their behalf.”
In a letter dated February 25 to two U.S. lawmakers, Tulsi Gabbard, the U.S. director of national intelligence, said the U.S. is examining whether the UK government had violated the CLOUD Act, which bars it from issuing demands for the data of U.S. citizens and vice versa, reports Reuters.
“My lawyers are working to provide a legal opinion on the implications of the reported U.K. demands against Apple on the bilateral CLOUD Act agreement,” Gabbard wrote to U.S. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, and Rep. Andy Biggs, an Arizona Republican.
