Apple Backers Protest Outside FBI Headquarters in D.C.

Privacy activists took to the streets Tuesday night, including outside FBI headquarters in Washington (pictured), to protest the government's attempt to get Apple to bypass its encryption on a phone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters.

The issue is more than a single phone or incident but more generally of government surveillance versus privacy rights and protecting business models.

The protests came exactly a week after the FBI obtained a court order, which Apple is fighting, that would require it to write software to override the deletion of data after 10 failed attempts to access it. The protestors say that would undermine the safety of hundreds of millions of people.

Apple has argued that, once created, the software could make data on all iPhones less secure.

Fight for the Future organized the protests, which were supported by Demand Progress and CREDO.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.