I imagine a judge would drop it on legal standing.

A civil lawsuit requires that you have some sort of damage that can be addressed and repaired. None of the scenarios fit that.

Let's say FBI found a back door. Apple tries to sue. The FBI will immediately ask for the grounds and standing. FBI is not doing anything to Apple, are not making any public statements about Apple (other than dropping the fight). They are not harming Apple or doing anything involving Apple in any visible way. FBI is working with someone else on a piece of property held as evidence.

If FBI reverse engineered it, again, Apple has no standing to sue. FBI did not harm Apple in reverse engineering it, although if it were released to the world they could. As it is such a reverse engineering would be police doing an investigation on evidence with no harm to Apple.

If Apple tried to get a C&D Order, what would they be demanding they cease? They might be searching for a violator of their EULA, which might be an interesting fight to subpoena or demand the names of those involved violating the license. It would be a tough sell because they'd still need to convince a judge that they were harmed in the process. No harm demonstrated means no legal standing.

And if FBI is bluffing, and really have done nothing, there is no harm done with the announcements that have been made of dropping the case. While potentially terrifying from a security perspective, there is nothing about the statement that harms Apple. Apple wanted it dropped, and FBI dropped it, that's what they wanted.


Nasty piece of work all around, maybe they do have a back door (beyond the existing sync back door they messed up with bad forensics), maybe they are bluffing, either way it makes Apple look bad yet Apple "wins" the fight by not needing to make the system they didn't want to make.

Doesn't reverse engineering to circumvent encryption run afoul of the DMCA?

Filing a DMCA violation against a government body would waft deliciously of irony, at any rate.

Proving damages should be easy.
Apple doesn’t want to make it because once it exists there is a risk of it getting out and sold on the black market.
They know already that it is impossible to 100% guarantee that their own engineers won’t sneak it home etc., and if such a concern applies to them then it applies to any company.

In other words, the damage is that once it gets made, by any company, there is a risk of it getting leaked etc. Even if this never happens it creates the perception of insecurity in buyers, which is also damage.

Proving damages is the easiest part of the case.


L. Spiro

If the 3rd party reverse-engineers Apple’s technology, couldn’t Apple sue them and force a cease-and-desist?

That assumes the justice department releases the identity of the 3rd party, no?

I don't believe there is a way to serve a cease-and-desist order to an unknown 3rd party...

Except the 3rd party is 'known'. Or suspected. Celebrate (llink to article). They've developed a method for unlocking passwords by analysing electrical signals exteranally, which lets them bypass the hardware lockouts.

Apple should be able to sue them.

Doubtful, again for reasons of legal standing.