Can somebody explain the room for debate and expression of sentiment here? If Apple was legally required to do x in regards to privacy, I have to assume they would and everyone could know they would (because it does not seem very big US company to outright defy national law). If they were not, on what ground, could the gov pressure Apple?
The theory would be that it would be extralegal pressure. Out of the Snowden era, for this generation, came the belief that the government would use extralegal coercion to get what they want when it comes to domestic espionage. This showed up in eg how the government battled Yahoo over PRISM [0], and the story of Joseph Nacchio of QWest [1] supposedly being targeted by the Feds for refusing to go along with the program/s.
For prior generations, Hoover, Nixon, MLK (how they targeted him), the Church hearings, and many other things provided evidence as to the extralegal behavior of the government at times.
Like when they started recording what programs you launch on your Mac, sent to them in cleartext? Or when they force you to have an account with them to install apps from the official sources (and of course the unofficial ones are absolutely atrocious).
Apple are better on the privacy front than their competitors, but not by that much.
Given what we learned from the Snowden leaks, I would be willing to believe that any PR in apples favor is awarded by the govt for exchange of their cooperation relating to providing the govt data / access they request.
I don't trust any corporation to actually side against the govt.
