Home Office issues new ‘backdoor’ order over Apple encryption

Timeline of UK government’s order for backdoor access into Apple’s encrypted iCloud service

• 29 August: Home Office ‘backdoor’ seeks worldwide access to Apple iCloud users’ data, court documents confirm
  – A court filing states that a government order against Apple would give it the capability to access communications and metadata of customers using the iCloud service anywhere in the world.
• 19 August: US says UK has agreed to drop encryption ‘backdoor’ demands against Apple – US and UK end diplomatic row over UK encryption ‘backdoor’ order against Apple, but it remains unclear whether Apple will restore advanced encryption services to UK users.
• 23 July: WhatsApp is refused right to intervene in Apple legal action on encryption ‘backdoors’ – Investigatory Powers Tribunal to hear arguments in public over lawfulness of secret UK order requiring Apple to give UK law enforcement access to users’ encrypted data stored on the Apple iCloud.
• 21 July: UK may be seeking to pull back from Apple encryption row with US – UK government officials say that attempts by the Home Office to require Apple to introduce ‘backdoors’ to its secure encrypted storage service will cross US red lines.
• 12 June: Apple encryption row: Does law enforcement need to use technical capability notices? History shows that law enforcement can bring successful prosecutions without the need for the Home Office to introduce ‘backdoors’ into end-to-end encryption.
• 11 June: WhatsApp seeks to join Apple in legal challenge against Home Office encryption orders – WhatsApp today applied to intervene in an Investigatory Powers Tribunal case that is considering the UK’s ability to issue a technical capability notice on Apple to ‘weaken encryption’.
• 11 June: Government using national security as ‘smokescreen’ in Apple encryption row – Senior conservative MP David Davis says the Home Office should disclose how many secret orders it has issued against telecoms and internet companies to Parliament.
• 5 June: US politicians are calling for Congress to rewrite the US Cloud Act to prevent the UK issuing orders to require US tech companies to introduce ‘backdoors’ in end-to-end encrypted messaging and storage.
• 15 April: The Investigatory Powers Tribunal is a semi-secret judicial body that has made significant legal rulings on privacy, surveillance and the use of investigatory powers. What does it do and why is it important? 
• 7 April: Investigatory Powers Tribunal rejects Home Office arguments that identifying the ‘bare details’ of legal action by Apple would damage national security, leaving open the possibility of future open court hearings.
• 2 April: Apple has appealed to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal over an order by home secretary Yvette Cooper to give the UK access to customers’ data protected by Advanced Data Protection encryption. What happens next? 
• 7 February: Tech companies brace after UK demands backdoor access to Apple cloud – The UK has served a notice on Apple demanding backdoor access to encrypted data stored by users anywhere in the world on Apple’s cloud service.
• 10 February: Apple: British techies to advise on ‘devastating’ UK global crypto power grab – A hitherto unknown British organisation, which even the government may have forgotten about, is about to be drawn into a global technical and financial battle, facing threats from Apple to pull out of the UK.
• 13 February: UK accused of political ‘foreign cyber attack’ on US after serving secret snooping order on Apple – US administration asked to kick UK out of 65-year-old UK-US Five Eyes intelligence sharing agreement after secret order to access encrypted data of Apple users.
• 14 February: Top cryptography experts join calls for UK to drop plans to snoop on Apple’s encrypted data – Some of the world’s leading computer science experts have signed an open letter calling for home secretary Yvette Cooper to drop a controversial secret order to require Apple to provide access to users’ encrypted data.
• 21 February: Apple withdraws encrypted iCloud storage from UK after government demands ‘backdoor’ access – After the Home Office issued a secret order for Apple to open up a backdoor in its encrypted storage, the tech company has instead chosen to withdraw the service from the UK.
• 26 February: US intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard probes UK demand for Apple’s encrypted data – A secret order issued by the UK against Apple would be a ‘clear and egregious violation’ if it provides backdoor access to Americans’ encrypted data, says US director of national intelligence.
• 5 March: Apple IPT appeal against backdoor encryption order is test case for bigger targets – The Home Office decision to target Apple with an order requiring access to users’ encrypted data is widely seen as a ‘stalking horse’ for attacks against encrypted messaging services WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal.
• 11 March: Secret London tribunal to hear appeal in Apple vs government battle over encryption – A secret tribunal is due to meet at the High Court in London to hear tech giant Apple appeal against a Home Office order to compromise the encryption of data stored by its customers on the iCloud service worldwide.
• 13 March: US Congress demands UK lifts gag on Apple encryption order – Apple and Google have told US lawmakers that they cannot tell Congress whether they have received technical capability notices from the UK.
• 14 March: The Investigatory Powers Tribunal holds a day-long secret hearing into an appeal brought by Apple against a government notice requiring it to provide law enforcement access to data encrypted by its Advanced Data Protection service on the iCloud, despite calls for the hearing to be opened to the public.
• 24 March: Gus Hosein, executive director of Privacy International – Why I am challenging Yvette Cooper’s ‘secret backdoor’ order against Apple’s encryption.
• 31 March: Apple devices are at ‘most risk’ in UK following government ‘backdoor’ order, Lord Strasburger tells the House of Lords as a Home Office minister declines to give answers.