The FBI will not be forced to reveal details about a hacking tool used to crack a terrorist's iPhone, a case that has preoccupied Apple's legal department and the US government for months.
Vice News, USA Today, and the Associated Press filed a Freedom of Information lawsuit seeking to reveal the name of the seller of the hacking tool and its price.
Recall that the Department of Justice had initiated legal action against Apple, which refused to help unlock the phone, claiming that the device's encryption could not be broken even by the company itself.
The FBI later managed to find a hacking tool that helped the feds unlock the device. Of course, the agency declined to provide details.
The tool allowed federal agents to access the contents of the phone of Syed Farook, who along with his wife Tashfeen Malik murdered 14 people in San Bernardino , California in December 2015.
A court issued its final ruling in favor of the FBI late Saturday.
In her ruling, Judge Tanya Chutkan said that reporting the vendor and the cost of the tool would be tantamount to putting a target on the FBI's back and could lead to the theft of the hacking tool...
“It is reasonable and reasonable that the seller is less capable than the FBI to protect its proprietary information against a cyberattack,” the court said.
"The FBI's conclusion that releasing the vendor's name to the general public could put the vendor's systems and therefore critical technology information at risk of intrusion is reasonable.".
The tool is said to have only worked for a few iPhone 5C devices running the older iOS 9 operating system.
However, the FBI told the court that it might later be able to find “a way to enhance the tool’s capabilities.”.
News outlets also struggled to find out the price of the tool, reporting that details had already been made public, by former FBI Director James Comey and Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), who quoted the tool's price as $1 million.
The court disagreed.
“Disclosure of the purchase price will establish a finite value for the technology and help adversaries determine whether the FBI can broadly use the technology to gain access to their encrypted devices,” the court said.
The decision is final, and there is no possibility of appeal.
