"To do a great right, do a little wrong", William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice
The Apple vs FBI dispute over the San Bernardino iPhone is a case with far reaching long-term consequences for all. No easy solution here. The balance between privacy and security is obviously is where people are focusing their attention. But while an important discussion, I don’t think this is what makes the case an extraordinarily complex one. We have solved this tension in so many ways in history. While for example we admit the access of banking records, we protect the privacy of the patient/doctor relationship or the lawyer/client privilege even for the most diehard criminals and terrorists. No. The case brings other issues. It exposes the tensions between the global technology companies and their internet ecosystems that hover different jurisdictions (democratic or not) and our judgment over the moral legitimacy of those same jurisdictions. We would not be having this discussion if every court of the world would be like an US Court, would we? This tension between global technology companies and different nation states and national public interest is manifesting itself in other disputes like taxes, just to cite one. And this is no different. It also touches individual corporate freedom. Apple thought it had protected itself from the pre-Snowden government interference by basically not creating a backdoor for its new IOS system. Can it be forced to create one? By just the US Legal System? Why not another Legal System? Believe me that this case will be a headline in history books many years from now. And whoever ends up judging this case will need the same extraodinary legal finesse that Portia showed in saving Antonio's pound of flesh while respecting Venice legal precedent. A tall order indeed.
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