Iphone and Ethical Issues Essay

On December 2, 2015, Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik walked into a federal building and killed 14 people and injured 22. The couple fled in an SUV and later got into a shootout with police officers and was killed in their vehicle. I don’t want to take away anything from the victims of this horrible tragedy, but this set the stage for the huge battle between a tech giant in Apple and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). During the FBI investigation, it was discovered that the male suspect Rizwan Farook had in his possession a locked IPhone-5C running the iOS 7 operating system. The FBI quickly discovered that this phone would be very difficult to unlock, so they decided to turn to Apple for help in solving this issue.

Another argument given against Apple was that, by not assisting the FBI, they were risking the national security of the United States and preventing the government from gaining valuable information about terrorists. Although we do not know for sure what was on the phone, we do know that the phone the FBI was trying to break into was the work phone of one of the San Bernardino shooters, Syed Farook. Farook destroyed all of his other electronics before the shooting. Why would he destroy all his other phones, yet not destroy his work phone? Also how much information would actually be on a work phone, when Farook had numerous other personal phones on which to make his calls? These two questions are related. Farook most likely did not destroy his work phone simply because he did not believe that there was any important evidence on it. Therefore, by not helping the FBI break into the phone, Apple likely wasn’t threatening the security of the United States.

For example some officials claim that this software is necessary for their investigation of the San Bernardino shootings. After this incident that happened in San Bernardino, the company was asked to release a software update that would make it easier for the FBI to guess the iPhone’s password. This change would not only have led to the backdoor to millions of iPhone users and expose a lot of their privacy but it would also allow to the government the potential power to unlock any iPhone in possession. The true moral dilemma for the Apple Company was deciding whether to help the FBI break into the terrorist phone or protect their user’s privacy. This is especially hard because Apple is a company that has been known for protecting its user’s privacy, keeping this in mind the company did what was moral right for their customers and refused to follow the FBI’s proposal. Tim Cook the CEO of apple had stated in his letter their customers; “We are challenging the FBI’s demands with the deepest respect for American democracy and a love of our country. We believe it would be in the best interest of everyone to step back and consider the implications.” The ethical or moral issue in this case was whether apple did the right thing by protecting its customer’s

The momentum of obsolescence became increasingly stronger as the decades passed, and in contemporary society, the dynamics of planned, technological, and psychological obsolescence is unmistakable. Today, products are made of faulty parts, and have become gradually more expensive to repair. Consumers are now forced to weigh up the price of repair alongside the price of a replacement, giving them little choice but to pick the easier alternative and replace the item. An example of this modern triad of obsolescence can be seen within the “Apple Conspiracy”, where it is alleged that Apple releases software updates for iPhones that instead of enhancing the performance of the phone as promised, actually degrade it by making the phone slow, and decrease the battery life. Coincidentally, this often occurs when the newest model of the iPhone is released, prompting frustrated users to either upgrade their phone, or deal with a degraded product. The conspiracy’s major mainstream moment was an article in the New York Times by Catherine Rampell:

Now for the case that has kept the nation on the edge of their seats, we have Apple v. FBI. This has really split the nation as people are torn apart by wanting to side with the makers of their beloved iPhone or the government that has given many their freedom. This all started with a tragedy, unfortunately, the tragedy the San Bernardino shooting. After the terrorists were killed, the FBI obtained the iPhone from one of the shooters and believed that they could find more information in it. They turned to Apple in order to open up the phone, as iPhones are set to ‘self-destruct’ all data after 10 failed password attempts. Apple flat out refused. In a letter to the public sent out by Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO, said, “Once the... way to bypass the code is revealed, the encryption can be defeated by anyone with that knowledge.” This essentially is saying that someone could come along after the phone had been

New top-end mobile phones such as the Apple Iphone are allowing a new class of mobile to emerge in the world today. Combined with its ease of use, rich design, and well-organized application system through Apple App Store makes the Iphone an appealing platform for development of other smartphones. The Apple IPhone was released on June 29, 2007 by CEO of Apple Steve Jobs (Honan). The IPhone offers many of the innovative features found on competing devices, but it also differs from other smartphones on the market.

“I believe Apple should help the FBI unlock a terrorist’s phone. Although doing this risks customer privacy, it's the price we have to pay for valuable information that could keep us safe in the long run. The ideal situation would be for Apple to create a way to unlock the iPhone without deleting information just this once and keep the way to do this confidential.”

You can look at the patent in the source underneath. This battery-sparing tech future gadgets have no affirmation with reference to regardless of whether it ought to be, But that is really a really decent sign of Apple innovation licenses.

Many companies in United States and around the world have started to worry about the iPhone usage and how much they are becoming dependent by organizations in order to conduct their business. Landman (2010) stated, “The threat from accidental or malicious misuse by employees is a significant threat to business” (p. 14). For this reason, using an iPhone in the workplace is putting companies on alert because the owner of the iPhone can store volatile information about their place where they work. Any information about the company such as e-mails, photos, and other digital evidence used in the work place could be sent to their competitors and used against the company itself and these are real life dangers in the corporate world.

This controversy will either cause Apple to do everything they go against or the government will put head on straight and instead of putting all of the citizens privacy in danger ,they will find another way to crack this phone.

All in all, Apple did choose the right thing of refusing to hack into the iPhone. If Apple would breach the Phone, then they would break the constitution by going against the first and fourth amendment. Also, if Apple did violate the device, then it would have hurt the brand name. To avoid any other issues such as this one in the future we should amend the constitution or add laws that adjust to changing technology in the

In todays world the delicate boundry between good and evil is a premise that is constantly being overlooked. Since when do we as Americans have to be so worried about our privacy? Well that began with the help of smartphones. Smartphones such as the Iphone created by Apple Inc. is a prime example a company that has loss sight of where they stand being right or wrong. Companies such as Apple insures consumers that their privacy is protected, however some expectations are to be made. Apple is one of the largest companies in the world, it does business with over 588 million users worldwide. A company of this stature in recent news has been bombarded and slandered due to its hypercritical behavior of releasing personal information of users of

Apple claims that the security policies for the phone relate to a physical object which can, therefore, be lost or misappropriated and consequently the physical device requires heightened security protocols;

Furthermore, there are 101 million users in the United States that currently have iPhones and millions more of foreign users outside the U.S . This case will affect a lot of consumers because if there was be a backdoor created, the FBI can have access to unlock your phone and surveillance every piece of your information. It’s a big deal to lots of consumers including tech companies because if the government has more power, they would take more control of our privacy and information of millions

The Wall Street Journal article was titled “iPhone 6s Review: A Slightly Better iPhone 6; the iPhone 6s addresses most of our smartphone complaints, but not the biggest--better battery”. The title alone shows support of the device and that it is improved from the previous models. In this article, the author addresses two of the major issues with the previous model, (IPhone 6), which