Judge: Apple must help FBI unlock San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone
Specifically, Apple must create custom firmware file so FBI can brute force passcode.

by Cyrus Farivar - Feb 17, 2016 2:26 am UTC
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Kārlis Dambrāns
On Tuesday, a federal judge in Riverside, California ordered Apple to help the government unlock and decrypt the iPhone 5C used by Syed Rizwan Farook, who shot up an office party in a terrorist attack in nearby San Bernardino in December 2015.

Specifically, United States Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym mandated that Apple provide the FBI a custom firmware file, known as an IPSW file, that would likely enable investigators to brute force the passcode lockout currently on the phone, which is running iOS 9.

As Judge Pym wrote:

Apple's reasonable technical assistance shall accomplish the following three important functions: (1) it will bypass or disable the auto-erase function whether or not it has been enabled; (2) it will enable the FBI to submit passcodes to the SUBJECT DEVICE for testing electronically via the physical device port, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or other protocol available on the SUBJECT and (3) it will ensure that when the FBI submits passcodes to the SUBJECT DEVICE, software running on the device will not purposefully introduce any additional delay between passcode attempts beyond what is incurred by Apple hardware. Lalasticlala, mynd44

They should open it, since it is for security use.