The battle between Apple and law enforcement officials over unlocking a terrorist’s smartphone is the culmination of a slow turning of the tables between the technology industry and the United States government.苹果公司与执法人员官员就密码一部恐怖分子用过的智能手机进行的战斗，意味著技术行业与美国政府之间再次发生较慢转变的局面转入高潮。After revelations by the former National Security Agency contractor Edward J. Snowden in 2013 that the government both cozied up to certain tech companies and hacked into others to gain access to private data on an enormous scale, tech giants began to recognize the United States government as a hostile actor.美国国家安全局前承包商雇员爱德华·J·斯诺登(Edward J. Snowden)2013年透露政府通过游说某些技术公司，并入侵其他公司来提供规模极大的私人数据之后，技术行业巨头们开始构成了把美国政府作为一个敌对方的了解。But if the confrontation has crystallized in this latest battle, it may already be heading toward a predictable conclusion: In the long run, the tech companies are destined to emerge victorious.但是，如果说双方的对付在这场近期战斗中变具体的话，战斗有可能早已在南北一个可预测的结局：从将来来看，技术公司预见不会取得胜利。

It may not seem that way at the moment. On the one side, you have the United States government’s mighty legal and security apparatus fighting for data of the most sympathetic sort: the secrets buried in a dead mass murderer’s phone. The action stems from a federal court order issued on Tuesday requiring Apple to help the F.B.I. unlock an iPhone used by one of the two attackers who killed 14 people in San Bernardino, Calif., in December.此时此刻，结局有可能看上去不是那样。对手中，一方是美国政府强劲的法律和安全性机器，它争夺战的是那种最能夺得同情的数据：藏在杀了的生产群体杀害的人手机里的秘密。政府的行动源自联邦法院周二的命令，命令拒绝苹果公司协助联邦调查局密码去年12月在加利福尼亚州圣贝纳迪诺杀掉14人的两名袭击者之一用过的iPhone。In the other corner is the world’s most valuable company, whose chief executive, Timothy D. Cook, has said he will appeal the court’s order. Apple argues that it is fighting to preserve a principle that most of us who are addicted to our smartphones can defend: Weaken a single iPhone so that its contents can be viewed by the American government and you risk weakening all iPhones for any government intruder, anywhere.另一方是世界上市值最低的公司，其首席执行官蒂莫西·D·库克(Timothy D. Cook)回应，他将对法院的命令明确提出裁决。

苹果公司指出，它在为维护一个原则而战，而我们中间那些着迷于智能手机的大多数人会反对这个原则：巩固一部iPhone，使其内容能被美国政府检查，你将面对一种为任何地方的任何政府巩固所有iPhone的风险。There will probably be months of legal tussling, and it is not at all clear which side will prevail in court, nor in the battle for public opinion and legislative favor.可能会有好几个月的法律竞逐，哪一方不会在法庭占上风还几乎不由此可知，谁不会夺得公众舆论和立法者的注目也不确切。

Yet underlying all of this is a simple dynamic: Apple, Google, Facebook and other companies hold most of the cards in this confrontation. They have our data, and their businesses depend on the global public’s collective belief that they will do everything they can to protect that data.然而，这一切的背后有一个非常简单的动力：苹果、谷歌、Facebook等公司掌控着掌控这场争夺战局势的大部分主动权。它们享有我们的数据，它们的业务依赖全球公众的集体信念，那就是公司将尽一切有可能来维护这些数据。Any crack in that front could be fatal for tech companies that must operate worldwide. If Apple is forced to open up an iPhone for an American law enforcement investigation, what’s to prevent it from doing so for a request from the Chinese or the Iranians? If Apple is forced to write code that lets the F.B.I. get into the Phone 5c used by Syed Rizwan Farook, the male attacker in the San Bernardino attack, who would be responsible if some hacker got hold of that code and broke into its other devices?这种信念的任何裂纹，对必需在全世界开展业务的技术公司来说，都有可能是可怕的。

如果苹果不得不为美国执法人员机构的调查密码了一部iPhone的话，有什么能制止它在中国或者伊朗的拒绝下这样做到呢？如果苹果不得不撰写代码、让联邦调查局转入生产圣贝纳迪诺攻击的男子赛义德·里兹万·法鲁克(Syed Rizwan Farook)用过的iPhone 5c的话，如果某个黑客取得了这些代码、用其闯进其他设备，那不会由谁来负责管理呢？Apple’s stance on these issues emerged post-Snowden, when the company started putting in place a series of technologies that, by default, make use of encryption to limit access to people’s data. More than that, Apple — and, in different ways, other tech companies, including Google, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft — have made their opposition to the government’s claims a point of corporate pride.苹果在这些问题上的立场是在斯诺登经常出现后构成的，那之后，公司开始使用一系列的技术，这些技术在配置文件情况下将使用者的数据加密以容许他人采访。不仅如此，苹果、以及还包括谷歌、Facebook、Twitter和微软公司在内的其他公司以有所不同的方式，都把它们赞成政府的主张作为企业的一种自豪。

Apple’s emerging global brand is privacy; it has staked its corporate reputation, not to mention invested its considerable technical and financial resources, on limiting the sort of mass surveillance that was uncovered by Mr. Snowden. So now, for many cases involving governmental intrusions into data, once-lonely privacy advocates find themselves fighting alongside the most powerful company in the world.苹果正在全球显露出的新品牌是隐私；它早已把公司的信誉遣在容许那种被斯诺登透露的大规模监听监控上，更加不必托在这方面投放了公司相当可观的技术和财务资源。所以在目前，就许多牵涉到政府入侵数据的案子而言，曾多次寂寞的隐私倡导者们找到他们正在与世界上最强劲的公司一起登陆作战。

“A comparison point is in the 1990s battles over encryption,” said Kurt Opsahl, general counsel of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy watchdog group. “Then you had a few companies involved, but not one of the largest companies in the world coming out with a lengthy and impassioned post, like we saw yesterday from Tim Cook. The profile has really been raised.”“可作为较为的事情是20世纪90年代有关加密的争夺战，”隐私监督的组织电子前沿基金会(Electronic Frontier Foundation)的法律总顾问库尔特·奥普萨尔(Kurt Opsahl)说道。“那时，有几家公司参予其中，但没世界上仅次于的公司，用一篇充满著激情的长文车站出来表态，就像我们昨天看见的蒂姆·库克所做到的那样。

现在的确是高调得多了。”Apple and other tech companies hold another ace: the technical means to keep making their devices more and more inaccessible. Note that Apple’s public opposition to the government’s request is itself a hindrance to mass government intrusion. And to get at the contents of a single iPhone, the government says it needs a court order and Apple’s help to write new code; in earlier versions of the iPhone, ones that were created before Apple found religion on privacy, the F.B.I. may have been able to break into the device by itself.苹果及其他科技公司还掌控一张王牌：使设备更加无法入侵的技术手段。必须留意的是，苹果公开发表断然拒绝政府拒绝，本身就是对政府大规模袭扰的一种妨碍。政府回应，为了提供这一部iPhone的内容，政府必须取得法庭命令，在苹果的协助下撰写新的代码；对于早期版本的iPhone，也就是苹果在隐私维护方面产生执著执着之前的版本，FBI也许自己就能转入这些设备。

You can expect that noose to continue to tighten. Experts said that whether or not Apple loses this specific case, measures that it could put into place in the future will almost certainly be able to further limit the government’s reach.预计套索不会之后放宽。专家们回应，无论苹果否赢这起官司，苹果未来采行的措施完全认同不会更进一步容许政府的影响范围。

That’s not to say that the outcome of the San Bernardino case is insignificant. As Apple and several security experts have argued, an order compelling Apple to write software that gives the F.B.I. access to the iPhone in question would establish an unsettling precedent. The order essentially asks Apple to hack its own devices, and once it is in place, the precedent could be used to justify law enforcement efforts to get around encryption technologies in other investigations far removed from national security threats.这不是说道圣贝纳迪诺攻击案件的结果不最重要。就像苹果及几名安全性专家说道的那样，命令强制苹果撰写软件，使得FBI可以转入涉及的iPhone，不会刷新一个令人不安的先例。这项命令基本上是拒绝苹果侵略自己的设备，一旦这么做到了，那么在其他预想牵涉到国家安全性威胁的调查中，这个先例就不会为跨过加密技术的执法人员行动获取正当理由。Once armed with a method for gaining access to iPhones, the government could ask to use it proactively, before a suspected terrorist attack — leaving Apple in a bind as to whether to comply or risk an attack and suffer a public-relations nightmare.一旦取得转入iPhone的方法，政府就可以拒绝在潜在恐怖袭击愈演愈烈前主动用于它，导致苹果陷入困境——是遵守命令，还是冒着攻击再次发生、遭遇公关噩梦的风险。

“This is a brand new salvo in the war against encryption,” Mr. Opsahl said. “We’ve had plenty of debates in Congress and the media over whether the government should have a backdoor, and this is an end run around that — here they come with an order to create that backdoor.”“这是鼓吹加密一方发动的一场全新的反击，”奥普萨尔说道。“国会和媒体早已就政府否应当享有后门的问题进行了很多辩论，现在他们要跨过辩论——必要命令开办后门。”Yet it’s worth noting that even if Apple ultimately loses this case, it has plenty of technical means to close a backdoor over time. “If they’re anywhere near worth their salt as engineers, I bet they’re rethinking their threat model as we speak,” said Jonathan Zdziarski, a digital forensic expert who studies the iPhone and its vulnerabilities.但值得注意的是，即便苹果最后赢官司，该公司掌控很多可以最后重开后门的技术。

“如果他们是能干的工程师，我开玩笑此时此刻他们正在重新考虑他们的威胁模型，”研究iPhone及其安全性缺失的数字核查专家乔纳森·兹阿尔斯恩(Jonathan Zdziarski)说道。One relatively simple fix, Mr. Zdziarski said, would be for Apple to modify future versions of the iPhone to require a user to enter a passcode before the phone will accept the sort of modified operating system that the F.B.I. wants Apple to create. That way, Apple could not unilaterally introduce a code that weakens the iPhone — a user would have to consent to it.兹阿尔斯恩回应，对于苹果来说，一种比较非常简单的解决问题方式就是转变未来发售的iPhone，在手机拒绝接受苹果根据FBI的意愿改动过的操作系统前，用户要输出密码来证实。

如此一来，苹果无法单方面引进巩固iPhone防水的代码，必须取得用户的表示同意。“Nothing is 100 percent hacker-proof,” Mr. Zdziarski said, but he pointed out that the judge’s order in this case required Apple to provide “reasonable security assistance” to unlock Mr. Farook’s phone. If Apple alters the security model of future iPhones so that even its own engineers’ “reasonable assistance” will not be able to crack a given device when compelled by the government, a precedent set in this case might lose its lasting force.“没什么能百分之百以防黑客，”兹阿尔斯基说，但他认为法官在这起案件中命令拒绝苹果获取“合乎情理的安全性帮助”，密码法鲁克的手机。如果苹果变更未来发售的iPhone的安全模式，以至于政府强制苹果密码涉及设备时，其工程师的‘合乎情理的帮助’也无济于事，该案件刷新的先例有可能也不会丧失持久力。

In other words, even if the F.B.I. wins this case, in the long run, it loses.换句话说，即便FBI输掉了这场官司，从将来来看，他们还是不会赢。

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