The iPhone 5C was at the center of a battle between the FBI and Apple.
Apple
The FBI unlocked an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters in 2015 with the help of an Australian cybersecurity company, a report said. Azimuth Security, a small infosec company based in Sydney, Australia, came up with the hacking solution for the FBI, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed sources.
According to the report, it took two Azimuth hackers to enter the iPhone 5C.
The FBI revealed in March 2016 that, with the help of a third party, it was able to access data on iPhone 5C used by one of the two San Bernardino shooters. Apple had refused to write software to unlock the phone, claiming that such software would weaken encryption for all other iPhone users.
The FBI spent more than $ 1.3 million hacking the iPhone, said former office director James Comey in April 2016.
Three news organizations sued the office in late 2016 for information about the way the FBI got into the iPhone, the agency launched 100 pages of strongly written documents in January 2017 in response. These documents censored who the FBI hired to enter the phone.
Last year, the FBI again criticized Apple and said the company had slowed down a national security investigation. refusing to help unlock two iPhones used by a shooter in an attack on December 6, 2019, at the Naval Air Station Pensacola in Florida, which left three dead.
Apple, Azimuth and the FBI did not immediately respond to requests for comment.