Terming Apple’s rhetoric as “false” the U.S. Justice Department in the high-profile precedent setting case said Apple’s arguments were “… also corrosive of the very institutions that are best able to safeguard our liberty and our rights: the courts, the Fourth Amendment, longstanding precedent and venerable laws, and the democratically elected branches of government,"
 
The FBI is trying to force Apple to unlock the encryption in its flagship smartphone which belonged to one of the San Bernardino shooters. Last month, the FBI even got a court order which demanded that Apple write new software which disables the passcode protection so that they can access Rizwan Farook, the shooter’s iPhone.
 
Apple has stood its ground and has yet to comply with the order since it says creating a "back door" to its smartphones could be potentially abused by criminals and government alike. It has also shot back saying the U.S. Congress has not authorized the Justice Department to make such demands.
 
The Justice Department’s filing was the last chance to make its case ahead of a hearing which is scheduled to take place in a Federal Court on March 22 in California.
 
Apple’s clash with the FBI’s demands has intensified long-running debates over the quantum of monitoring capability law enforcement and intelligence agencies should have in this digital age.
 
Portraying its stance as "the primary guardian of Americans' privacy" Apple has attacked the FBI’s investigation and has termed it as "shoddy".
 
Prosecutors from the Justice Department have countered saying Apple has "deliberately raised technological barriers" so as to prevent the execution of a warrant.
 
Apple has maintained that if it were to comply with such requests it would open the floodgates of pressure for the company from repressive regimes which are likely to want similar assistance.
 
The Justice Department has countered saying, "… according to Apple's own data, China demanded information from Apple regarding over 4,000 iPhones in the first half of 2015, and Apple produced data 74 percent of the time."
 
As per the FBI, Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik carried out their shooting which killed 14 people on December 2. They were inspired by Islamic militants. The FBI wants to read the data in Farook's work phone in order to unravel potential links with other militant groups he may have worked with.
 
While the Justice Department has received support from six relatives of the San Bernardino victims, leaders from the tech industry, including, Microsoft, Google and Facebook have stood behind Apple.
 
Prosecutors have said the Justice Department’s requests are not about undermining encryption but to narrowly access the "non-encryption barrier" in the iPhone.
 
Citing a 1807 case wherein it was held that a clerk working for Aaron Burr, the then former U.S. Vice President, could be forced to decode a letter penned by Nurr if doing so did not lead to self-incrimination, prosecutors from the Justice Department have held requesting decryption services  isn’t something new.
 
Earlier this week, the Justice Department tried to overturn a rule which protected Apple from unlocking an iPhone in a drug case in New York which raised similar issues. In that case, a Brooklyn judge gave Apple two weeks to respond to the government's bid.
 
 

In what could potentially have far reaching legal consequences for tech companies including social networking giant Facebook, Germany’s cartel office has disclosed that it has opened an investigation into the abuse of market power by Facebook through numerous instances of breach of data protection law.
 
In the wake of the lapse in renewal of the Safe Harbor Framework, the European Court of Justice had ruled that tech giants including Google and Facebook, will not be allowed to move the data that relates to EU citizens out of the Eurozone.
 
The watchdog has disclosed that it suspects Facebook is abusing its dominant position in the social networking market through tweaking its terms of service agreement of its use of user data.
 

An Israeli startup, Skyfi, is racing to outflank Google and Facebook in providing cheap access to the internet for worldwide access by developing the world’s first self-correcting antenna which can capitalise on the signals provided by mini-satellites and turn them into powerful transmitters covering the entire globe.

Google has taken a different route to the problem and it plans on increasing internet access throughout the globe, including remote areas by means of high-flying balloons. Facebook on the other hand has a more complex system in mind and is looking at an integration of drone and increased dependence on complex satellite communication technology.

As per Raz Itzhaki Tamir, a veteran of Israel's aerospace industry who co-founded Skyfi four years ago, it will take a cluster of 60 nano-satellites, with each measuring around the size of a shoe, to provide internet access throughout the world.

Tamir’s visision for worldwide internet access rests on these shoe sized nano-satellites deploying their antennas in space and mechanically re-adjusting themselves to overcome the limitations of the ground-based transmitter. These satellites should even be able to alter the direction their antennas are pointing at in order to tackle possible broadcasting related issues in the course of the satellite’s life.

Although this sounds simple enough, these two issues have acted as Himalayan hurdles in the past and have limited the efficacy of a satellite.

Skifie has disclosed that it has a "proof of concept" in its hand, however, don’t expect a fleet of these shoe-sized satellites for at least a couple of more years. If the antennae functions as it should, it is likely to attract big business.

With thousands of new satellites expected to be launched in the coming decade, Israel, with its expertise in miniaturization and given its military bent of mind, is likely to capture a sizeable chunk of the booming commercial space market.

In its latest funding round, Skyfi has successfully raised $3 million thanks to Jerusalem Venture Partners, one of Israel’s most successful venture capital funds. It has now signed letters of intent so as to sell its antenna’s to global players such as Spacecom and Lockheed Martin.

Significantly, Facebook is collaborating with Spacecom in order to increase access to the internet in Africa. If Skyfie’s antennas are successful, their demand is likely to surge.

"This type of solution will conquer the market, because it addresses some of the most serious and bothersome issues for satellite operators," said David Pollack, CEO of Spacecom.

Skifie is now in the process of fine tuning a larger version of its antennas in a soundproof chamber, which mimics the condition of space, measuring 50-square-meter. In the next 18 months, Skyfie plans on launching the first batch of its satellites in space.

"Currently, if an antenna is not perfect, you have to live with it, with the losses. We can change that and be flexible, thus gaining more revenue from the satellite," said Tamir.