14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft founder Bill Gates has suggested in an interview earlier today that Apple should support the US government in the San Bernardino iPhone case and lend a hand to investigators trying to break into the device to search for content that could prevent future terrorist attacks.
And while most reports claimed that Bill Gates defended the FBI in this dispute against Apple, Microsoft’s founder claimed in a new statement that this wasn’t what he actually meant to say in the first interview.
Instead, what he was trying to say was that the two sides must find the right balance between security and privacy, so he called for further discussions between the government and technology companies that might be impacted by court orders.
More tempered comments this time
Clearly, Bill Gates has tempered his comments on this case in just a few hours, probably because Microsoft, the software empire that he founded, could be dragged into a dispute similar to that affecting Apple should one of its devices be used in criminal activities that would require the FBI to break into them.
“That doesn't state my view on this. I do believe there are sets of safeguards where the government shouldn't have to be completely blind,” Bill Gates explains in a new statement.
"You don’t just want to take the minute after a terrorist event and swing that direction, nor do you, in general, want to completely swing away from government access when you get some abuse being revealed. You want to strike that balance. Clearly the government's taken information historically and used it in ways we didn't expect, going all the way back to the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover," he continues in his interview for Bloomberg Go.
Right now, opinions are still divided on whether Apple should help the FBI break into the iPhone used by the San Bernardino attackers or not, but for the moment, it’s very clear that Cupertino has no plans to do this. And at the same time, the government has no intention of giving up on its demands either.