[Cryptography] EFF amicus brief in support of Apple

[Ron Garret]

On Mar 5, 2016, at 11:12 AM, Allen <allenpmd at gmail.com> wrote:

> There is quite a bit of existing law — both common and statutory — around signatures, both digital and analog.
> ... 
> The principal criterion for being a legal signature is that it is the intent of the signer that it be a legal signature.
> 
> You just proved my point.  Apple is being asked to provide a numerical code that unlocks the device, not to provide a legal signature that is intended to be a legal signature.  You can call a pig a dog, but it is still just a pig.  And you can call a numerical unlock code a signature, but it is still just a numerical unlock code.

That doesn’t matter.  If you sign a confession under duress, that is technically not a legal signature because it was not your intent.   But that doesn’t change the fact that it is 1) illegal to coerce someone to sign a confession and 2) that signing a confession under duress can have very similar deleterious effects on the signer as signing one willingly.  Specifically, Apple will have revealed itself as being willing to sign code under duress, and so now Apple’s signature can no longer be trusted by its users.  That trust has significant value, and destroying it constitutes actual harm.

rg

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