Apple recently filed a legal response to a court order ordering it to unlock the iPhone used by San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook, for the FBI. It had been given an extension to file its first response. The Steve Jobs co-founded company stated in the motion trying to overturn the court order it would take much time and many resources to build a new operating system to bypass encryption on the California terrorist's smartphone.
Its 65-page document was filed on February 25, Thursday. Apple explained that the work required to allow the federal agency to access the iPhone 5c's data would be a "burden," according to Wired.
The tech giant has named the operating system it would create "GovtOS." It would disable/bypass the iPhone's erase data function allowing electronic password submissions, and remove delays between each password entry try.
Lisa Olle is Apple's manager for global privacy and law enforcement team. She signed the motion.
The document states that designing, building, validating, deploying, and deleting an OS for the FBI would require 10 engineers and two to four weeks. More government requests would make the process exponentially more difficult.
Apple's motion also stated that it would have to write new code for the unlocking functions and documents so it could add Apple's digital key to the software.
The FBI has claimed it only wants to unlock the iPhone in the San Bernardino case. However, Apple has stated it would create a standard that could be used in other situations involving different devices, cases, and judges. That would happen in the United States and worldwide.
Apple claimed that if it follows the FBI's request it would open the "floodgates" to a series of similar requests from law enforcement, according to Yahoo. That would risk the privacy of Apple's devices including smartphones, tablets, and smartwatches.
The California-based company also claimed that the company's code is protected speech based on the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
Apple argued that the FBI's request goes against the company's right to free speech and its own viewpoint. That is based on iPhones' safety features.
Other tech titans have supported the position of Apple CEO Tim Cook. They include Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and Twitter.
Here's tech giants' response to the FBI's encryption bypass request: