Apples claims a user-friendly software, but some in the company take issue with the complexity of the system. Window Snyder, a former Apple security and privacy manager, claims that users might lose data such photos and like, if they forget the password and Apple doesn’t have the keys. She added that if Apple keeps a copy of the key, the copy might be compromised or the service can be constrained to turn it over. However, Apple already stores some data that it cannot access or read, in a feature called iCloud Keychain, where a user can store passwords and credit-card information.
The situation raised a red flag when Apple refused to unlock the phone of San Bernardino gunman Syed Rizwan Farook. Apple has fought the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s requests to help unlock Mr. Farook’s iPhone, which was last backed up on its iCloud service, on 19 October 2015, about six weeks before he and his wife killed 14 people in a terrorist attack.
The timing of any move to strengthen encryption is uncertain, this being an issue for other companies, like Box, which it took three years to design a system to encrypt corporate information without forcing users to download additional apps.
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