Hacking San Bernardino Shooter’s Phone at FBI Request ‘Bad For America’

Apple CEO Tim Cook said that hacking at the request of FBI into the phone of the shooter in the December terrorist attack in San Bernardino would make Americans more vulnerable.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Hacking at the request of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) into the phone of the shooter in the December terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California would make Americans more vulnerable and ultimately be bad for the rest of the United States, Apple CEO Tim Cook said during an interview.

"This would be bad for America, it would also set a precedent that I believe that many people in America would be offended by," Cook told ABC News in an interview released on Wednesday.

In recent weeks, Apple has received legal requests to assist the FBI in accessing the encrypted iPhone used by one of two Islamic terrorists that killed 14 people in San Bernardino, California on December 2.

Cook explained that protecting people’s data is extremely important and doing what the US law enforcement has requested "could expose people to incredible vulnerabilities, and this is not something that we would create."

Asked whether he was concerned that by rejecting the FBI’s request he could potentially fail to prevent another terrorist attack, Cook explained "some things are hard, and some things are right, and some things are both; this is one of those things."

Apple and a number of technology companies have consistently denied US law enforcement requests to create "back doors" for accessing information on their devices, arguing that creating such a mechanism would undermine the security of millions of other devices and also open up the doors to bad actors.