Governments keep pressing for ways to read encrypted data, and Apple keeps refusing. The latest clash is over what Britain wants from Apple: a way to read iCloud backups belonging to users in the country.
Court records show Apple filed a fresh complaint in July with the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, the body that handles disputes over technical capability notices. The Financial Times first reported the filing, which challenges a notice served under the Investigatory Powers Act.
Such notices can force companies to hand UK security services access to customer data, including content protected by end-to-end encryption. The demand was originally broader: the Home Office first sought access covering customers in both the UK and the US, then withdrew that version after pressure from Washington and issued a narrower notice aimed only at British users, prompting Apple to suspend Advanced Data Protection enrollment for new UK users and shift the fight to the tribunal.
Apple says it has never built a backdoor or master key, and argues that creating one would weaken security for everyone while forcing a redesign of the service.
Privacy International learned of the filing through the tribunal and, together with Liberty, is running a separate case over similar notices that reaches a hearing in December. Because neither side can discuss technical capability notices openly, the complaint’s full scope remains unknown.
