蘋果抵抗政府監控的啓示 勝利終將屬於科技公司

The battle between Apple and law enforcement officials over unlocking a terrorist’s smartphone is the culmination of a slow turning of the tables between the technology industry and the United States government.

蘋果公司與執法官員就破解一部恐怖分子用過的智能手機展開的戰鬥，意味着技術行業與美國政府之間發生緩慢改變的局面進入高潮。

After revelations by the former National Security Agency contractor Edward J. Snowden in 2013 that the government both cozied up to certain tech companies and hacked into others to gain access to private data on an enormous scale, tech giants began to recognize the United States government as a hostile actor.

美國國家安全局前承包商僱員愛德華·J·斯諾登(Edward J. Snowden)2013年披露政府通過拉攏某些技術公司，並侵入其他公司來獲取規模巨大的私人數據之後，技術行業巨頭們開始形成了把美國政府作爲一個敵對方的認識。

But if the confrontation has crystallized in this latest battle, it may already be heading toward a predictable conclusion: In the long run, the tech companies are destined to emerge victorious.

但是，如果說雙方的對抗在這場最新戰鬥中變明確的話，戰鬥可能已經在走向一個可預測的結局：從長遠來看，技術公司註定會取得勝利。

It may not seem that way at the moment. On the one side, you have the United States government’s mighty legal and security apparatus fighting for data of the most sympathetic sort: the secrets buried in a dead mass murderer’s phone. The action stems from a federal court order issued on Tuesday requiring Apple to help the F.B.I. unlock an iPhone used by one of the two attackers who killed 14 people in San Bernardino, Calif., in December.

此時此刻，結局可能看起來不是那樣。對手中，一方是美國政府強大的法律和安全機器，它爭奪的是那種最能贏得同情的數據：藏在死了的製造羣體謀殺的人手機裏的祕密。政府的行動源於聯邦法院週二的命令，命令要求蘋果公司幫助聯邦調查局破解去年12月在加利福尼亞州聖貝納迪諾殺死14人的兩名襲擊者之一用過的iPhone。

In the other corner is the world’s most valuable company, whose chief executive, Timothy D. Cook, has said he will appeal the court’s order. Apple argues that it is fighting to preserve a principle that most of us who are addicted to our smartphones can defend: Weaken a single iPhone so that its contents can be viewed by the American government and you risk weakening all iPhones for any government intruder, anywhere.

另一方是世界上市值最高的公司，其首席執行官蒂莫西·D·庫克(Timothy D. Cook)表示，他將對法院的命令提出上訴。蘋果公司認爲，它在爲保護一個原則而戰，而我們中間那些癡迷於智能手機的大多數人會支持這個原則：削弱一部iPhone，使其內容能被美國政府檢查，你將面臨一種爲任何地方的任何政府削弱所有iPhone的風險。

There will probably be months of legal tussling, and it is not at all clear which side will prevail in court, nor in the battle for public opinion and legislative favor.

可能會有好幾個月的法律角逐，哪一方會在法庭佔上風還完全不可知，誰會贏得公衆輿論和立法者的青睞也不清楚。

Yet underlying all of this is a simple dynamic: Apple, Google, Facebook and other companies hold most of the cards in this confrontation. They have our data, and their businesses depend on the global public’s collective belief that they will do everything they can to protect that data.

然而，這一切的背後有一個簡單的動力：蘋果、谷歌、Facebook等公司掌握着控制這場爭奪戰局勢的大部分主動權。它們擁有我們的數據，它們的業務依賴於全球公衆的集體信念，那就是公司將盡一切可能來保護這些數據。

Any crack in that front could be fatal for tech companies that must operate worldwide. If Apple is forced to open up an iPhone for an American law enforcement investigation, what’s to prevent it from doing so for a request from the Chinese or the Iranians? If Apple is forced to write code that lets the F.B.I. get into the Phone 5c used by Syed Rizwan Farook, the male attacker in the San Bernardino attack, who would be responsible if some hacker got hold of that code and broke into its other devices?

這種信念的任何裂紋，對必須在全世界開展業務的技術公司來說，都可能是致命的。如果蘋果被迫爲美國執法機構的調查破解了一部iPhone的話，有什麼能阻止它在中國或者伊朗的要求下這樣做呢？如果蘋果被迫編寫代碼、讓聯邦調查局進入製造聖貝納迪諾襲擊的男子賽義德·里茲萬·法魯克(Syed Rizwan Farook)用過的iPhone 5c的話，如果某個黑客獲得了這些代碼、用其闖入其他設備，那會由誰來負責呢？

Apple’s stance on these issues emerged post-Snowden, when the company started putting in place a series of technologies that, by default, make use of encryption to limit access to people’s data. More than that, Apple — and, in different ways, other tech companies, including Google, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft — have made their opposition to the government’s claims a point of corporate pride.

蘋果在這些問題上的立場是在斯諾登出現後形成的，那之後，公司開始採用一系列的技術，這些技術在默認情況下將使用者的數據加密以限制他人訪問。不僅如此，蘋果、以及包括谷歌、Facebook、Twitter和微軟在內的其他公司以不同的方式，都把它們反對政府的主張作爲企業的一種驕傲。

Apple’s emerging global brand is privacy; it has staked its corporate reputation, not to mention invested its considerable technical and financial resources, on limiting the sort of mass surveillance that was uncovered by Mr. Snowden. So now, for many cases involving governmental intrusions into data, once-lonely privacy advocates find themselves fighting alongside the most powerful company in the world.

蘋果正在全球顯露的新品牌是隱私；它已經把公司的信譽押在限制那種被斯諾登披露的大規模監聽監視上，更不用提在這方面投入了公司可觀的技術和財務資源。所以在目前，就許多涉及政府侵入數據的案子而言，曾經孤獨的隱私倡導者們發現他們正在與世界上最強大的公司一起作戰。

“A comparison point is in the 1990s battles over encryption,” said Kurt Opsahl, general counsel of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy watchdog group. “Then you had a few companies involved, but not one of the largest companies in the world coming out with a lengthy and impassioned post, like we saw yesterday from Tim Cook. The profile has really been raised.”

“可作爲比較的事情是20世紀90年代有關加密的爭奪戰，”隱私監督組織電子前沿基金會(Electronic Frontier Foundation)的法律總顧問庫爾特·奧普薩爾(Kurt Opsahl)說。“那時，有幾家公司參與其中，但沒有世界上最大的公司，用一篇充滿激情的長文站出來表態，就像我們昨天看到的蒂姆·庫克所做的那樣。現在的確是高調得多了。”

Apple and other tech companies hold another ace: the technical means to keep making their devices more and more inaccessible. Note that Apple’s public opposition to the government’s request is itself a hindrance to mass government intrusion. And to get at the contents of a single iPhone, the government says it needs a court order and Apple’s help to write new code; in earlier versions of the iPhone, ones that were created before Apple found religion on privacy, the F.B.I. may have been able to break into the device by itself.

蘋果及其他科技公司還握有一張王牌：使設備越來越難以侵入的技術手段。需要注意的是，蘋果公開回絕政府要求，本身就是對政府大規模侵擾的一種阻礙。政府表示，爲了獲取這一部iPhone的內容，政府需要獲得法庭命令，在蘋果的幫助下編寫新代碼；對於早期版本的iPhone，也就是蘋果在隱私保護方面產生執着追求之前的版本，FBI或許自己就能進入這些設備。

You can expect that noose to continue to tighten. Experts said that whether or not Apple loses this specific case, measures that it could put into place in the future will almost certainly be able to further limit the government’s reach.

預計套索會繼續收緊。專家們表示，無論蘋果是否輸掉這起官司，蘋果未來採取的舉措幾乎肯定會進一步限制政府的影響範圍。

That’s not to say that the outcome of the San Bernardino case is insignificant. As Apple and several security experts have argued, an order compelling Apple to write software that gives the F.B.I. access to the iPhone in question would establish an unsettling precedent. The order essentially asks Apple to hack its own devices, and once it is in place, the precedent could be used to justify law enforcement efforts to get around encryption technologies in other investigations far removed from national security threats.

這不是說聖貝納迪諾襲擊案件的結果不重要。就像蘋果及幾名安全專家說的那樣，下令強迫蘋果編寫軟件，使得FBI可以進入相關的iPhone，會創下一個令人不安的先例。這項命令基本上是要求蘋果入侵自己的設備，一旦這麼做了，那麼在其他遠未涉及國家安全威脅的調查中，這個先例就會爲繞過加密技術的執法行動提供正當理由。

Once armed with a method for gaining access to iPhones, the government could ask to use it proactively, before a suspected terrorist attack — leaving Apple in a bind as to whether to comply or risk an attack and suffer a public-relations nightmare.

一旦獲得進入iPhone的方法，政府就可以要求在潛在恐怖襲擊爆發前主動使用它，致使蘋果陷入困境——是遵從命令，還是冒着襲擊發生、遭遇公關噩夢的風險。

“This is a brand new salvo in the war against encryption,” Mr. Opsahl said. “We’ve had plenty of debates in Congress and the media over whether the government should have a backdoor, and this is an end run around that — here they come with an order to create that backdoor.”

“這是反加密一方發起的一場全新的攻擊，”奧普薩爾說。“國會和媒體已經就政府是否應該擁有後門的問題展開了很多辯論，現在他們要繞過辯論——直接下令開設後門。”

Yet it’s worth noting that even if Apple ultimately loses this case, it has plenty of technical means to close a backdoor over time. “If they’re anywhere near worth their salt as engineers, I bet they’re rethinking their threat model as we speak,” said Jonathan Zdziarski, a digital forensic expert who studies the iPhone and its vulnerabilities.

但值得注意的是，即便蘋果最終輸掉官司，該公司掌握很多可以最終關閉後門的技術。“如果他們是稱職的工程師，我打賭此時此刻他們正在重新考慮他們的威脅模型，”研究iPhone及其安全缺陷的數字取證專家喬納森·茲阿爾斯基(Jonathan Zdziarski)說。

One relatively simple fix, Mr. Zdziarski said, would be for Apple to modify future versions of the iPhone to require a user to enter a passcode before the phone will accept the sort of modified operating system that the F.B.I. wants Apple to create. That way, Apple could not unilaterally introduce a code that weakens the iPhone — a user would have to consent to it.

茲阿爾斯基表示，對於蘋果來說，一種相對簡單的補救方式就是改變未來推出的iPhone，在手機接受蘋果根據FBI的意願改動過的操作系統前，用戶要輸入密碼來確認。如此一來，蘋果不能單方面引入削弱iPhone防護的代碼，需要獲得用戶的同意。

“Nothing is 100 percent hacker-proof,” Mr. Zdziarski said, but he pointed out that the judge’s order in this case required Apple to provide “reasonable security assistance” to unlock Mr. Farook’s phone. If Apple alters the security model of future iPhones so that even its own engineers’ “reasonable assistance” will not be able to crack a given device when compelled by the government, a precedent set in this case might lose its lasting force.

“沒有什麼能百分之百防黑客，”茲阿爾斯基說，但他指出法官在這起案件中下令要求蘋果提供“合乎情理的安全協助”，破解法魯克的手機。如果蘋果更改未來推出的iPhone的安全模式，以至於政府強迫蘋果破解相關設備時，其工程師的‘合乎情理的協助’也無濟於事，該案件創下的先例可能也會失去持久力。

In other words, even if the F.B.I. wins this case, in the long run, it loses.

換句話說，即便FBI贏了這場官司，從長遠來看，他們還是會輸。