The FBI has not yet decided if it will share its secrets in hacking the San Bernardino shooter's iPhone with Apple. It also revealed that it was only able to hack the iPhone 5c and not any other gadget.
The FBI Director, James Comey, spoke to an audience at Kenyon College in Ohio on Wednesday and called their ability to hack the iPhone a "technological corner case." He added that the agency exploited the weakness of the Apple software but it only works on a "narrow slice of phones."
That could mean only the iPhone 5C which runs on version 9 of the tech giant's mobile operating system and not in later or older models.
"If we tell Apple, they're going to fix it and we're back where we started," said Comey. "As silly as it may sound, we may end up there. We just haven't decided yet," he added.
Comey also mentioned in his speech that they bought "a tool" from a third party so that the agency can unlock the iPhone of the San Bernardino shooter.
"The people we bought this from, I know a fair amount about them, and I have a high degree of confidence that they are very good at protecting it, and their motivations align with ours," Comey said.
"Litigation between the government and Apple over the San Bernardino phone has ended, because the government has purchased, from a private party, a way to get into that phone, 5C, running iOS 9," he added.
Late last month, the agency announced that they have already unlocked the iPhone of Syed Farook, one of the San Bernardino shooters. Initially, the government tried to use the court to force Apple to crack its iPhone.
This prompted Sheri Pym, a U.S. Magistrate to order the tech giant to comply with the request of the government agency. It precipitated the debate that pitted national security concerns against digital privacy.
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