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The secret service is considering preventing employees from using iMessage on agency iPhones in the future, with claims that the loss of text messages related to the January 6 Capitol uprising was due to the way encrypted messages are managed.
Apple’s iMessage is considered a secure messaging due to the use of encryption for communication. However, it appears that the secure nature of the system is being blamed for the sudden loss of potential evidence for Capitol uprising investigations.
On July 13, Congress was informed by the DHS Inspector General that the Secret Service had lost a number of text messages related to the 2021 attack. In an update on July 29, the Secret Service is reportedly considering removing iMessage to prevent the issue from happening in the future.
“This is something we are looking at very closely,” said Anthony Guglielmi, Secret Service spokesman told Politics. “Director James Murray has commissioned a benchmark study to further explore the feasibility of disabling iMessage and whether it could have operational implications.”
It is alleged that the Secret Service’s implementation of a new mobile device management platform may have caused the problem. While the platform can be used to centrally manage emails, images, and other data, using iMessages encryption meant that communications were stored on devices, but could not be automatically backed up.
Because many agents failed to manually back up data themselves before wiping and reconfiguring the new management platform, those iMessage communications stored on the device were removed.
“We want to ensure that any policy actions we take do not adversely affect our protection or investigative missions,” Guglielmi said, and that the agency is “looking at other technology solutions.”
While iMessage may be criticized for being too secure, other elements of Apple’s ecosystem have been more helpful in tracking down and prosecuting participants in the uprising. One participant in May pleaded guilty as a result of evidence that turns up in his iCloud account, after he got his iPhone in an ocean.