Apple Inc. vs FBI: A Social Contract Perspective (Essay Sample)

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Apple Inc. vs FBI: A Social Contract Perspective
My perception of Jean Jacques Rousseau’s concept of the social contract concerns the situation when the state fails to fulfill the civil obligations, the citizens have a right to disobey the laws or withdraw their support through legitimate means. Quite often, in democratic regimes, the government is elected by the majority of the populace to represent their collective will. Therefore, the social contract between the state and the society is embedded in the mutual trust that a democratic regime will guard the privacy of its citizens and the citizens shall obey the law. However, the power structure of the government operations may overlook this basic obligation and pervasively betray the trust bestowed upon it by the citizens. I believe that Apple Inc.’s position and refusal to help decrypt the iPhone used by the perpetrator in the San Bernardino terrorist attack as the actual representation of the general will. According to Rousseau, liberty and authority are not contradictory, and legitimate laws are founded on the collective will of the citizens. Therefore, by protecting privacy, Apple Inc. strives to obey the legitime laws founded by the collective will as a member of the political community of the American society.
From my point of view, the legal battle between Apple Inc. and the FBI over the access of the iPhone device belonging to the perpetrator highlights the social significance of the Jean Jacques Rousseau’s perception of the social contract between the government and the citizens. A month after the shooting, a federal judge ordered Apple Inc. to help the FBI unlock the iPhone used by the shooter in what he termed as “the reasonable technical assistance” that required the telecommunication giant to overhaul the iOS 7 that disables the phone after ten unsuccessful password attempts (Bennet and Queally par. 2). The encryption system used by Apple Inc.’s devices is such that it destroys the data after ten consecutive and unsuccessful password attempts to protect user data. However, Tim Cook publicly declined to help the FBI decrypt the phone terming it as a pervasive intrusion that would compromise the privacy of its customers. Cook reiterated that a move to decrypt or change the algorithm of the iOS would create a loophole capable of devastating future devices or when in the wrong hands, could be used to unlock any iPhone (Kharpal par. 2). The court order was interpreted by the company as an overreach by the government and a gross violation of the constitutional rights of the public. However, the FBI insisted that the location on the phone, data, and other subtle pieces of information be crucial for investigating and answering important questions about the perpetrators’ movement during the twenty-minute gap timeline following the mass shooting. Although Cook defended his stance arguing that by helping FBI decrypt the iOS algorithm for the perpetrators iPhone would undermine the security protocol feature of all iPhone users, the bureau sought a court injunction alleging that this was a special, one-off case of its kind. Apple Inc. vs. FBI is among one of the high profile cases centered around encryption and data privacy between the government and public corporations. The government insists that data encryption used by telecom companies make it difficult to protect the public against terrorist attacks. On the other hand, telecom companies maintain that they are obliged to encrypt customer data to guarantee safety and privacy at all times. Critics argue that with increasing globalization, civil litigations between government agencies and data handling companies are likely to increase with each party defending its course of actions based on the collective interests of the public.
I concur with fact that Apple Inc.’s refusal to succumb to the court orders is a manifestation of the sovereign will of the populace for which the government’s preservation of power cannot overrule. In The Social Contract Book I, Jean Jacques Rousseau argues that “Man is born free; and everywhere, he is in chains. One thinks himself a master of others and remains a greater slave than they are” (The Social Contract Book 1: Rousseau 1). This statement is a summary of the case between the government and Apple Inc. concerning the civil liberties of all the players. On the one hand, the citizens have entrusted the safety of their civil liberties on the government and at the same time entrusted their privacy to Apple Corporation. Rousseau’s social contract theory reiterates the situation whereby the citizens abandon some of their civil liberties to the state in exchange for protection and freedom. Consequently, the citizens in democratic regimes exercise their civil liberties by voting a given regime trusting that it will safeguard their collective values and civil liberties as articulate in the constitution. Therefore, a democratic regime, the federal government, in this case, has been mandated with the collective power of its citizens to protect and preserve all the civil liberties regarding privacy, unwarranted search, and entry as dictated by the Fourth Amendment Act of 1791. By Coercing Apple Inc. to overwrite its security protocols meant to protect the public right to privacy, the government presumes that it reserves the right to govern the private affairs of its citizens. However, according to Rousseau, this is a far-fetched and an untenable assumption. Although the operations of the government may be authoritative, those in power are enslaved to the collective interests and the civil liberties of the majority who have elected the government. Rousseau argues that the first liberty stems from the nature of humankind in what he describes as the first law of self-preservation:
The first liberty results from the nature of man. His first law is to provide for his own preservation, his first cares are those to which he owes to himself. As soon as he reaches years of discretion, he is the sole judge of the proper means of preserving himself, and consequently becomes his own master. (The Social Contract Book I: Rousseau 2).
I think, the federal requirement for Apple Inc. to help decrypt the iPhone used by the terrorist can be seen as a desire for self-preservation of the legitimacy of the justice system and not a genuine representation of the collective interests of the citizens. A corporation, though an artificial person, enjoys the full rights of natural persons, and in this case, Apple Inc. subscribes to the equal rights to safeguard its interests. Moreover, Apple Inc., in all its operations is socially contracted to uphold the privacy of its customers through existing mutal agreements. However, Apple Inc. and other citizens are dependent on the ruling regime for freedom and the protection of other civil liberties. As Rousseau reiterates, the dependency of the citizens’ to the ruling regime is short-lived and is prone to change as soon as the populace reaches years of discretion. Hence, once the period of preservation elapses and the people attains the discretion period, they gain independence from the state and autonomously decide what is best in their interest. The citizens achieve independence with the ability to challenge the government supposed to protect their common interests. Although the government’s criminal justice system must strive to protect the state’s sovereignty through all means possible, this right is limited because the citizens strive to preserve their privacy because it is a constitutional right. This unfolding highlights the reason why most of Apple’s customers were against the government’s coercion of the company to decrypt the suspect’s cellphone.
In Rousseau’s terms, my opinion is that the common will of the governed cannot be alienated from the sovereign entities by the instruments of power. Tim Cook’s defense for customer privacy from intrusion by the government reveal this fact. On whether the sovereignty of a state is alienable, Rousseau argues that the collective will mandated in the constitution, and established by the governing principles alone, is sufficient enough to guide the common objectives. Rousseau argued that the common good and the will of the people that make a civil society possible arise as a result of the disagreements between different interests (Social Contract Book II: Rousseau 1). Therefore, the Apple Inc. vs. FBI case highlights a situational progression of the society towards the collective will of the government and its citizens. Rousseau insists that the common element in the disagreements regarding the collective interests strengthen the social ties (The Social Contract Book II: Rousseau 1). Hence, the social contract according to Rousseau is solely based on the common interests of the ruling regime and its citizens. Therefore, the Apple Inc. vs. FBI represents a situation whereby, both parties serve the collective interests of the society but from different perspectives. Rousseau makes a profound distinction between sovereignty and the collective will of the people in what he terms as the autonomy of the governed. He refers to the sovereignty of a state as the process of exercising the collective will of all the parties in that particular society. Moreover, he maintains that the collective will cannot be alienated and the sovereign citizens can only be represented by themselves because, even though the power can be transmitted, the collective will cannot (The Social Contract Book 2: Rousseau 2). From this perspective, we can assess Tim Cook’s argument that by developing the software that would decrypt or bypass the key security features would render the iOS on every Apple device vulnerable to the cyber-at...