Backdoor report: British government wants full access to iCloud
It has still not been finally decided whether Apple must give British law enforcement access to iCloud. The full scope of the data has now been revealed.
Flag of Great Britain on a map of Europe.
(Image: hyotographics / Shutterstock.com)
As part of its "Snoopers' Charter", a comprehensive espionage law called the Investigatory Powers Act, the British government wanted access to all of Apple's iCloud data – and not just those that the company has specially secured. This was reported by the Financial Times, citing documents from the administration under Labor Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who appears to be continuing the policy of the previous Conservative government under the Tories.
Access to all iCloud data of all protection classes worldwide
According to the report, the UK apparently wants unlimited access to all iCloud data worldwide via a backdoor to be set up by Apple. The fact that this was requested via a so-called – and secret – Technical Capability Notice (TCN) only became known because Apple is defending itself against it before a special tribunal. The US government had already vetoed the request, and President Trump had even compared the British plans to China. Most recently, US intelligence officer Tulsi Gabbard said that London had decided not to spy on American citizens and to bury the backdoor plans. However, according to the Financial Times report, there is still no official decision from the British government.
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Apple had deactivated its Advanced Data Protection (ADP) security function in the UK, which the company had introduced to further secure iCloud in 2023. This means that not even Apple itself knows the iCloud content because it is encrypted with a key that is only available to the user. iCloud Drive and other sensitive content such as the valuable device backups in iCloud, which are coveted by investigators, can now be protected. Observers had assumed that the British government primarily wanted to access this content via the Investigatory Powers Act, but the government agencies there appear to be demanding a kind of dedicated line to the iCloud data centers.
Secret proceedings with "assumed facts"
What exactly is in the TCN remains secret. The proceedings currently being heard by the special tribunal are also largely secret. Disclosure of the contents is only possible because both parties are talking about hypothetical orders ("assumed facts"), a kind of legal trick to ensure that the lawyers do not make themselves liable to prosecution. According to the Financial Times, further information on exactly what the British government is demanding will only be known if Apple wins the case. Whether this will be the case, however, remains to be seen.
According to the documents seen by the Financial Times, the TCN contains an obligation "to provide and maintain a function to disclose categories of data stored in a cloud-based backup service". The document also states in black and white that the British government does not only want to view information of British users (or those who are in the UK), but "globally for all relevant data categories of all iCloud users". It is not yet clear what the EU Commission thinks of the UK's snooping request, which would also affect EU citizens.
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