FBI can't unlock Texas church gunman's cellphone

[applegrove]

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/world/texas-church-gunman-cellphone-1.4392517

"SNIP......

Still, the issue re-emerged Tuesday, when Christopher Combs, the special agent in charge of the FBI's San Antonio division, said agents had been unable to get into the cellphone belonging to Devin Patrick Kelley, who slaughtered much of the congregation in the middle of a Sunday service.

"It highlights an issue you've all heard about before. With the advance of the technology and the phones and the encryption, law enforcement is increasingly not able to get into these phones," Combs told reporters. He did not provide further details other than saying the device was being flown to an FBI lab for analysis. "We're working very hard to get into that phone, and that will continue until we find an answer," Combs added.

....

Combs was telegraphing a longstanding frustration of the FBI, which claims encryption has stymied investigations of everything from sex crimes against children to drug cases, even if they obtain a warrant for the information.

Half of mobile devices inaccessible

Agents have been unable to retrieve data from half the mobile devices — more than 6,900 phones, computers and tablets — that they tried to access in less than a year, FBI Director Christopher Wray said last month, wading into an issue that also vexed his predecessor, James Comey.

......SNIP"

[guillaumeb]

1. Why does it really matter?

All of the speculation of motivation, and life history, and politics, all ignore the fact that in a country that is awash in guns, guns are the weapon of choice, especially for mass murder.

[applegrove]

3. Would you think government would like to know how the shooter deteriorated

from a domestic abuser to a mass shooter. Insight into the psychology.

[guillaumeb]

7. I believe that ther might be Constitutional issues.

And sane gun regulation would accomplish far more.

[applegrove]

10. You can do both.

[mythology]

17. But you can't change the laws of math

The problem is there is no way to have encryption that is good that has a known backdoor. All those CIA exploits that were recently leaked and the Snowden releases prove that the government can't hold a secret forever.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/07/even-former-heads-of-nsa-dhs-think-crypto-backdoors-are-stupid/

[jberryhill]

9. I would think the government's interest is in prosecuting crimes

The criminal in this instance appears to be dead. Calls and texts made from that phone to possible conspirators are in the billing records.

But, no, I don't understand the point here, unless the relevant police department is in the psychological research business.

Domestic abusers turn into shooters all of the time. No great mystery there.

[former9thward]

13. Not sure what your definition is of "all the time."

There are about 10 million victims of domestic violence in the U.S. every year. How many of those turn into shooters? Whatever the number it is a tiny, tiny percent.

https://ncadv.org/statistics

[VMA131Marine]

4. Because, they want to find out if the gunman had any help

or got any encouragement to do this.

[guillaumeb]

8. All after the fact.

And it would neither predict nor prevent the next occurrence.

It is all about easy access to firearms.

[malaise]

11. That fugging simple

It is way too easy to access assault rifles and these large cartridge magazines

[sarisataka]

12. Were I an FBI agent

I can think of a host of things I would like to look for in his phone,

-was he in contact with someone at the shop where he bought his guns who knew he was prohibited but sold to him anyway
-did he have an accomplice who provided any assistance
-was he in contact with others who have might take violent action for any perceived wrongs
-did he provide weapons or ammo to another person who was flagged

Just for starters.

[guillaumeb]

14. But all of this after the fact knowledge,

while useful for prosecuting a case, is nor predictive of who will be the next shooter, or where it will occur.

But what is fairly certain is that the next mass shooting will involve easily available weapons and high capacity magazines.

[Iliyah]

2. It's the FBI for gawd's sake

They need to check with San Bernardino police.

[zipplewrath]

6. The Russians

It's a different kind of phone from that. But they could probably check with Russian Hackers.

[lagomorph777]

5. Putin has some guys who could do it.

Maybe Trump can hook them up. He seems to enjoy telling the FBI what to do.

[Wellstone ruled]

15. Hey get one of the Kids.

Works for me.

[unc70]

16. Try the Israeli firms with products for this

They have been selling systems that do this to local law enforcement for a number of years. In recent years, the problems have become a bit more difficult as Apple and others have improved their security and encryption. But more difficult does not mean impossible.

[Blue_Tires]

18. So they just hire some freelance hacking firm to do it

like they did last time with San Bernadino: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/fbi-has-accessed-san-bernardino-shooters-phone-without-apples-help/2016/03/28/e593a0e2-f52b-11e5-9804-537defcc3cf6_story.html?utm_term=.3b0f61f6cb85

The irony that mass shooters, pederasts and Islamic terrorists would be the ones who reaped the most reward from Snowden's "Encrypt All The Things" -campaign is not lost on me....

[lostnfound]

19. How about we replace the right to bear arms with right to private cellphones?

I'm half kidding but what a crock that America has massive lobby stopping the government from sensible gun regulations but no lobby saying that the government doesn't have an inalienable right to hack into ones phone.

I know, terrorists can use the devices to terrorize and creeps can trade sick pictures, but in this case, it seems a little beside the point. No collusion or collaboration was required for one twisted mind to blow away an entire church. Wanting to know WHY he did it is mostly dark curiosity and won't bring back a single life.

[Igel]

20. There are two lobbies for cell phone privacy.

One is the privacy lobby in general. EFF comes to mind, for electronic-related privacy.

The other is specifically phone companies who make money because they sell encryption.

The "why" isn't just morbid curiosity; however, painting it as such does serve to dismiss and minimize a possible distraction.