Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/11/24/apples-head-of-security-indicted-in-ipads-for-gun-licenses-bribery-case.html
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I unwarily lit a cigarette in an outdoor green space at One Infinite Loop in 2005 (when Apple had only just begun its joyless-megacorp phase), and they were pretty fashy about that. So I can only imagine the black-shirted enforcement legions at the current donut. Which, thinking about it, might be that shape because it houses some kind of Bauhaus-influenced particle beam weapon.
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Is it that hard to get a concealed carry license? In NC, it’s like $200 bucks and a can’t-fail-it class. Way less than the value of an iPad.
And for that matter, would you be willing to commit a felony for an iPad? The risk vs. reward metric doesn’t add up. People make such poor decisions.
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I live in NC too, but I will readily admit that it is unlikey to be middle of the road for getting a CC license. California is considered one of the toughest, if not the toughest: https://news.armscor.com/5-most-difficult-states-to-obtain-a-carry-permit#
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I thought this was sort of a known secret, where in CA and other more restrictive states you can get a license if you know the right people/grease the right palms.
CA basically reserves them for ex-cops and the well connected. It’s BS when only authority and the elite can exercise their rights legally.
But color me a bit surprised such a big fish with such a big bribe was caught.
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When you grift one iPad, you can just disappear. When you grift 200 iPads, they will find you, unless they think you’re already dead.
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That’s one of the reasons why a lot of gun-nuts call it ‘Commie-fornia’. It’s extremely difficult to legally own and carry a slug thrower there.
Our ‘not-a-state’ Puerto Rico is pretty damn strict as well.
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“When they gave him the job, they gave him a gun. The Deliverator never deals in cash, but someone might come after him anyway-might want his car, or his cargo. The gun is tiny, acm-styled, lightweight, the kind of gun a fashion designer would carry; it fires teensy darts that fly at five times the velocity of an SR-71 spy plane, and when you get done using it, you have to plug it into the cigarette lighter a Thunderbolt port, because it runs on electricity.”
With due apologies to the good Mr. Stephenson, that’s much more how I imagine Apple’s sinister corpsec dudes would roll.
Guns are so…repulsively…field-serviceable; some of them with widely available 3rd-party components no less.
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Dumb to bribe someone with a device that has your logo on it. Next we’ll find out the permit issuers gave him a receipt for the bribe.
This is the kind of crime people do when they’re very confident they’re above the law.
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It’s a drop in the bucket compared to the normal stream of felonies they’re committing.
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Who could have thought that letting something happen at the discretion of local police would lead to corruption and bribery?
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It took me a couple reads to get your drift, but yes, I am sure their open source, maker friendly, right to repair, no “walled gardens” of many models makes Apple bristle in the jimmies at the idea of it.
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They probably all use something like this, or something designed and made in-house (not like they’re short of machine tools after all)
Though in all seriousness, Apple doesn’t dislike open source software, or even third-party products; they just don’t want you repurposing what they make, as that is already perfected once it leaves their hands.
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That particular combination does not sound good.
It’s amazing how many posters here missed the important part–the real wrongdoing here is on the part of the police, not Apple. This is just another example of government officials demanding a payoff. We think of mandatory bribes as a third-world thing, but when you’re dealing with the government they’re all too often even here in America.
Apple perfectly well knows that fighting this in court would take years and very well might not succeed.
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I think I noticed… 
I’m hurt you didn’t noticed I noticed.
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Got to be embarrassing when your henchmen make the news like this.
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This got me imagineering an Apple designed gun. Of course the physical UI such as the trigger would be replaced with screen controls. Convenient pairing with the iWatch lets you know how many rounds have been fired and will reorder the correct bullets from iTtunes Armory subscription service. Three months later Microsoft releases a gun of their own but a heavy handed security protocol requires you to manually add people to your whitelist of targets before you can shoot someone and when they eventually shutter the DRM servers all the guns are bricked but no one notices.
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That was my first thought.
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