Surveillance Firm Says Apple Is 'Phenomenal' For Law Enforcement

Secret recordings of a surveillance firm's presentation show how much iCloud data Apple surrenders to law enforcement with a warrant -- though it's Google and Facebook that can track a suspect to within three feet. Apple Insider reports: PenLink is a little-known firm from Nebraska which earns $20 million annually from helping the US government track criminal suspects. PenLink also sells its services to local law enforcement -- and it's from such a sales presentation that details of iCloud warrants has emerged. According to Forbes, Jack Poulson of the Tech Inquiry watchdog attended the National Sheriff's Association winter conference. While there, he secretly recorded the event.

During the presentation, PenLink's Scott Tuma described how the company works with law enforcement to track users through multiple services, including the 'phenomenal' Apple with iCloud. Apple is open about what it does in the event of a suboena from law enforcement. It's specific about how it will not unlock iPhones, for instance, but it will surrender information from iCloud backups that are stored on its servers. 'If you did something bad,' said Tuma, 'I bet you I could find it on that backup.' Tuma also says that in his experience, it's been possible to find people's locations through different services, although not through iCloud. '[Google] can get me within three feet of a precise location,' he said. 'I cannot tell you how many cold cases I've helped work on where this is five, six, seven years old and people need to put [the suspect] at a hit-and-run or it was a sexual assault that took place.' It's also possible for law enforcement and firms like PenLink which help them, to get location data from Facebook and Snapchat.

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