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The Forensic Shit Show

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It turns out someone at the FBI advised another law enforcement officer in San Bernardino to reset the iPhone that the government wants Apple to unlock.

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This is just another episode in a complete forensic shit show.

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Remember, this is the same case where the media was allowed to roam freely through a crime scene. One of the photos in that gallery shows a computer without an Ethernet connection on the wall (the age of the apartment also suggests that there would be no wired Internet.)

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What are the chances that there was a wireless network in that apartment? What are the chances that there are IP logs on that router? Or maybe some kind of data backed up to a disk on the router? Here’s another wild guess: maybe that router was used to connect to an online backup service.

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Yep, someone did the equivalent of a “restore factory defaults” on a device under active investigation.

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What we’re seeing here is law enforcement’s complete lack of understanding of how digital devices store and transmit data. This new evidence is much more intricate than smoking guns or blood splatters. The important stuff is what you don’t see: it’s a hard problem where the people dealing with it are untrained. Shit, I work in this business and trying to decipher what’s going on makes my head spin.

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Yet law enforcement is asking Apple to not only provide data, but also to create a forensic instrument that allows them to extract information from any device. And by its very nature, this tool would be made widely available throughout the forensic and law enforcement community.

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Basically, the government is asking Apple to hand over a golden key that can defeat the security of any device to folks that can’t even secure a wireless network. Worse, this whole process is being overseen by politicians that think the problem is predators getting access to their grandkid’s Playstation.

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This is why the entire tech community is saying “No fucking way.”

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Updated February 21st, 2016: Several people have commented about my use of “restore factory defaults” in the post above. My intention was figurative, not literal.

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The folks involved with the investigation were pressing buttons without understanding the consequences of their actions. To me, it feels like a “reboot to fix” approach. The password reset did not damage any data, it just made automatic backups stop working because iCloud information on the device needed to be updated, and that can’t be done without a passcode.

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Others have reminded me that the FBI had cleared the crime scene. That’s true, but since the Wi-Fi equipment was not collected as evidence, it still shows that the investigators were out of their league. In an electronic investigation, a router is a key piece of the puzzle.

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Both of these things are details in a bigger picture: the FBI wants to hold the private keys to a public key encryption system that affects the privacy of hundreds of millions people. If they can’t get the details of an online backup service right, how the hell do we expect them to guard a back door?

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There’s also a possibility that the iCloud password reset was intentional. If this is the case, we have a government that is extorting Apple by essentially planting evidence. Imagine what they could do with a private key.

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+ Written on February 20th, 2016 for Miscellaneous, Opinion
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Strapped In

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A lot has happened since I purchased my Apple Watch on April 10th, 2015. One unexpected aspect to owning this device is my fascination with watch bands:

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+Apple Watch Bands

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My current collection of watch bands. And no, the watch isn’t upside down.
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From left to right, in order of date purchased:

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  • +Sport Model with Blue Band ($400) – I picked the aluminum watch with a blue band because I knew it would be spending a lot of time in the water. To date, I’ve used it 110 times for over 35 hours of swimming. +
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  • +Milanese Loop ($150) – I was intrigued by this band as soon as I saw it during the video at the product announcement. I love how the metal feels a lot like fabric. It also dresses up the utilitarian Sport model so it doesn’t look out of place when I’m someplace nice. +
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  • +Black & Silver Nylon ($30) – This NATO-style band from Clockwork Synergy popped up on my Twitter timeline thanks to my pal Rob Rhyne. I love that it dresses up the watch and is waterproof. +
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  • +Red Sport ($50) – When Apple started selling additional colors for the sport bands, getting one in my favorite color was a no-brainer. I also like that a little of my purchase goes to a worthwhile charity. +
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  • +Orange Silicone ($20) – This band by MoKo was another recommendation from Twitter by Neven Mrgan. To me, the most interesting thing about this band is that it shows why Apple went with fluoroelastomer for their bands: it’s stiffer and “breathes” better than silicone. +
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  • +Black Goat Leather ($200) – The leather bands from Apple are nice, but I prefer the classic look of this one from Lucrin. The company also offers a huge range of colors: my wife loves the dark green one I gave at Christmas. +
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In this survey of my growing collection, there’s an interesting datapoint: the value of these bands ($450) exceeds the cost of the watch itself ($400).

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If Apple decides to change the interchange mechanism in some future version of the watch, I will have very little desire to upgrade. As I continue to “work in” my leather band, I hope I’ll be using them for a long time.

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+ Written on December 29th, 2015 for Miscellaneous, Observation
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The New iPod

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Something tells me that there were a lot of Apple Watches under the tree this year:

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Clicker Downloads for December 2015

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That graph shows the last month of downloads for my free Clicker app for watchOS. Since this app does nothing on an iPhone or iPad, the only reason to get it is if you have a new watch.

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Many of us, myself included, originally thought of the Apple Watch as a device in and of itself. But the more I use the computer on my wrist, the more it feels like a satellite to the computer that’s sitting in my pocket.

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Accessories have always made great gifts for folks who love their computers. Giving the watch as a gift is a perfect option for someone who’s always playing around with the apps on their iPhone. Just like the iPod was an ideal match for someone who loved playing music on their desktop computer.

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+ Written on December 28th, 2015 for Business, Observation
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A Responsive Factory

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Back in May 2014, we introduced a new Iconfactory home page. One of the main design goals for that site was to make the layout a responsive web design: the same site looked great whether you were looking at it on a desktop PC or an iPhone. Reading Ethan Marcotte’s book was a revelation.

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Of course, that site was just a beginning. We run a lot of web sites (including some you’ve probably never heard of before). Clearly we had to pick our responsive battles.

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We started with an update to our blog in January 2015. In October, we updated our iOS and OS X app catalog. And yesterday we launched a responsive design portfolio.

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A year and a half after our first responsive design, we’ve hit a milestone. All of the sites listed in the Iconfactory’s red navigation bar are responsive designs and will display correctly on any device. Woo hoo!

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Along the way, we cleaned up some of our branding elements and worked toward a more consistent experience across all the sites. Check out the post at the Iconfactory about the new SVG icons in Safari to see what that’s all about.

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It’s clear we’re at a point in time where the vast assortment of screens is daunting. If you haven’t thought about how your site works on this wide variety of devices, now is a great time to start.

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+ Written on November 4th, 2015 for Design, Development
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