The move by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to execute a search warrant at a reporter’s home was scandalous. But at least the feds aren’t able to access her iPhone, thanks to Apple’s Lockdown Mode.
The Washington Post is now busy laying off journalists, but a few weeks ago, the newspaper was furious over the FBI’s raid on the home of Hannah Natanson, its reporter.
The raid, decried by press freedom groups as highly unusual and shockingly inappropriate, was part of an investigation into a government contractor’s alleged retention of classified materials.
Calling the move to nab her devices an “outrageous seizure,” the Post is demanding that the US government return all of them – a work iPhone 13, a MacBook Pro owned by the Post, another MacBook Pro owned by Natanson, a 1TB portable hard drive, a voice recorder, and a Garmin watch.
Untouchable iPhone
The thing is that the investigators didn’t really get anywhere with device analysis. Yes, the FBI accessed the reporter’s work laptop by telling her to place her finger on the MacBook Pro’s fingerprint reader.
But then, a federal magistrate judge issued a standstill order telling the government to stop searching the devices until the court rules on whether they must be returned.
And in a filing opposing a motion by the newspaper and Natanson, the Department of Justice says their agents couldn’t process the iPhone “to preserve the information therein.”
“The iPhone was found powered on and charging, and its display noted that the phone was in ‘Lockdown’ mode,” the government filing said.
It explained that the Computer Analysis Response Team (CART) of the FBI’s Washington field office couldn’t extract anything from the iPhone.
The Department of Justice says their agents couldn’t process the iPhone “to preserve the information therein.”
The feds did dig up some information from the SIM card “with an auto-generated HTML report” which was created by the tool utilized by CART, but “the data contained was limited to the telephone number.”
Got zilch from personal laptop, too
Natanson’s work MacBook Pro was accessed as it’s allowed by law since 2024 for the authorities to use an individual’s biometrics, such as facial recognition or fingerprints, to open their devices.
This is why the feds were able to read some of the reporter’s Signal messages on her work laptop. This is also why some experts are urging users to turn off biometrics on their devices.
That’s a good idea, at least if you’re based in the US. Included in the search and seizure warrant for the raid on Natanson’s home is a section titled “Biometric Unlock.”
It explicitly authorized law enforcement personnel to obtain Natanson’s phone and both hold the device in front of her face and forcibly use her fingers to unlock it.
Still, the FBI didn’t get anything from the reporter’s personal laptop, either: it’s password-protected and encrypted.
Lockdown Mode is not a panacea
According to Apple, its Lockdown Mode, introduced in 2022, “helps protect devices against extremely rare and highly sophisticated cyber attacks” and is “designed for the very few individuals who, because of who they are or what they do, might be personally targeted by some of the most sophisticated digital threats.”
Introduced in 2022, Lockdown Mode is available for iPhones, iPads, and Macs. It must be enabled separately for each device.
However, Apple’s attempt to manually limit a device’s attack surface is no panacea. Even if the Lockdown Mode stopped the FBI in its tracks, it will hardly protect a victim from dedicated nation-state attackers in the long run.
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“The reality is that nation-state hackers, who are the real focus of this new Apple protection, are going to review this software update just like every other developer,” cybersecurity expert Brian Contos explained to Cybernews back in 2022.
“They are going to test it out, poke it and prod it, and figure out new ways to work around it.”
Plus, the very fact that the Lockdown Mode strips the device OS of a lot of functionality and features that can be exploited makes you wonder whether journalists – who have little use for a partly bricked phone – will choose to use the feature. Natanson did – good for her.
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