The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) confirmed in a memo Friday that its method to crack an iPhone in the San Bernadino terrorism case was applicable to other phones, and they we’re willing to help State and Local law enforcement agencies in doing so.

According to the memo, obtained by Reuters, the Bureau said it understands the challenges other law enforcement authorities face in lacking the necessary tools to monitor and investigate the communications of suspects who use encrypted mobile devices, and that as per its long-standing policy the FBI will of course consider providing access to any tool that might be helpful to their partners.

“Please know that we will continue to do everything we can to help you consistent with our legal and policy constraints,” the note added.

The confirmation that the methodology used to crack an iPhone could be successfully be applied to other phones came following the suspension of the Department of Justice’s attempts to force Apple, Inc. to provide a backdoor to the iPhone March 21st, and the subsequent full withdrawal of the case March 29, with the justification for the withdrawal saying that “the government has now successfully accessed the data stored on [the] iPhone and therefore no longer requires assistance from Apple.”

Disclosure

Confirmation that encryption is breakable on the iPhone range has led to calls that the FBI should disclose how it did so, given that it would seemingly have to have found a flaw in iPhone encryption to begin with.

A potential vulnerability not only provides access to law enforcement but mean that millions of Apple devices could potentially be targeted by bad actors looking to do everything from steal personal data through to installing malware and ransomware

“One way or another, Apple needs to figure out the details,” AVG Technologies lawyer Justin Olsson told Ars Technica “The responsible thing for the government to do is privately disclose the vulnerability to Apple so they can continue hardening security on their devices.”

Apple has sold hundreds of millions of iPhones, and while the iOS platform has been fairly immune from the same sort of malware attacks seen on the more open Android platform, the risks are huge, and the news of a new vulnerability will simply embolden those in the cybercrime business to target the platform even more so than they are currently doing.

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