Apple has received an extension in the timeline that it has to reply to a court order to modify an iPhone for the FBI. The deadline, originally Tuesday, has been pushed out to Friday, February 26th, TechCrunch has learned.
Apple will need to make its case why the FBI’s request to create a special version of iOS is burdensome and taxes the limits of the 200-year-old All Writs Act. News of the extension was previously reported by Bloomberg.
The FBI’s request includes three separate asks. It wants Apple to disable or bypass the auto-erase function of iOS that erases your phone if too many wrong passwords are input. It also wants Apple to remove the delay on password inputs so that the FBI can ‘guess’ the iPhone’s passcode without it locking them out for minutes or hours.
Most controversially, it also wants Apple to create a new version of iOS that allows the submission of passcodes via wireless protocol like Bluetooth or Wifi or the physical port on the device.
Apple has objected in a strongly worded letter by its CEO Tim Cook, but it will now have to respond legally and a court will have to decide whether to compel it to comply.
