The United States government has launched a probe to determine if the United Kingdom has reneged on a bilateral agreement, over British demands placed on Apple.
The investigation has been opened after reports claimed the U.K. government has instructed Apple to build a global backdoor into iCloud, venturing into data that even the tech giant cannot currently reach.
In a letter sent from Tulsi Gabbard, President Trump’s Director of National Intelligence, to Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon and Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona, she has asserted that the White House was unaware of the secret demand made by her counterparts in the U.K. Home Office.
In her return correspondence to Wyden and Biggs, she has outlined concerns that the British government may have broken a bilateral agreement on privacy and surveillance, due to the expectations placed on Apple.
The Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act (CLOUD Act), passed by Congress in 2018, sets an agreement between the U.S. and foreign jurisdictions to share data for serious crime investigations, with embedded protections for privacy, civil liberties, and online transparency.
This week, Apple has rushed to fix an iPhone dictation glitch that swapped “racist” to “Trump”.
The CIA, NSA and multiple other US intelligence agencies have been asked to examine a reported request from the UK government for Apple to implement a backdoor in their encryption.
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Clear and egregious violation
The context of the potential breach is the British approach for a backdoor to enable authorities to access all encrypted customer data. This has led to Apple suspending its most advanced security tool for U.K. users.
Advanced Data Protection (ADP) is an opt-in feature that goes beyond the default protections for iCloud content, to apply end-to-end encryption. This means only the user can see the data, beyond the reach of Apple.
The UK’s backdoor instruction means customers who have been using ADP will lose access to it, at a later date, but Apple has not said when the change will be applied, or how many users will be impacted.
With the global reach of such backdoor access, Gabbard has stated this egress into iCloud would “be a clear and egregious violation of Americans’ privacy and civil liberties”, which would also “open up a serious vulnerability for cyber exploitation by adversarial actors”
Gabbard’s letter detailed the instructions given to various authorities to investigate the issue while engaging with U.K. government officials.
She added, “My lawyers are working to provide a legal opinion on the implications of the reported UK demands against Apple on the bilateral Cloud Act agreement.”
It will be interesting to see if ADP returns to U.K. users, and what implications there will be if it does not, with the precedent created of a general backdoor key for any purpose that places universal customer data at risk of exposure.
Image credit: Grok/X
