England may want to block iPhone updates in the future for a very special reason. Could that also happen in the Netherlands?
England wants to block some iPhone updates
It actually sounds quite absurd: England wants Apple to ask permission for iPhone updates from now on whether they can apply the fix. The government of England demands that because otherwise Apple will close security holes that they use themselves.
This is not the first time that England has wanted to block certain iPhone features. Earlier, the government of England planned to amend the IPA (Investigatory Powers Act) so that they could force Apple to turn off certain security features. And all without informing users.
At the moment, the British government can already demand this from Apple, but then there is an independent third party that monitors the overall course of events. In addition, Apple has the option to appeal the claim.
But when England actually implements the update of the IPA legislation, the security functions must be disabled immediately. With this, England can also block any iPhone updates.
Is this also possible in the Netherlands?
At the moment we don’t have to worry too much about this in the Netherlands. But even within the European Union, these kinds of things come up every now and then. So was leaked in one government document of Spain read that the country intends to one day ban end-to-end encryption in the EU.
In the Netherlands it does not seem to be happening so quickly at the moment. In the past, the ministers already adopted a position to not to weaken encryption due to back doors. Nevertheless, the discussion here also regularly stirs up again.
Recently Outgoing Minister Yesilgöz responded to parliamentary questions from the CDA about the online sharing of child abuse. In addition, she said that end-to-end encryption is often used, which makes it difficult to track down the criminals.
That is why she believes it is important that it should be possible ‘under appropriate conditions and guarantees’ for investigative services to gain access to the encrypted messages.
For the time being, circumventing iPhone security by the government does not seem to be an issue in the Netherlands. But if England manages to block some iPhone updates, more countries will undoubtedly follow.
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