The FBI paid over $1 million to hack iPhones.

(Baonghean.vn) - FBI Director James Comey announced on April 21 (local time) that the FBI paid over $1 million to a company for hacking the iPhone of terrorist Syed Farook.

FBI Director James Comey revealed details about the cost the FBI paid to hack the iPhone at a security conference held on April 21st in London. (Image: Cnet)

Speaking at a security conference in London, FBI Director James Comey was asked to reveal the fee the FBI charges to unlock an iPhone. "A lot, more than my total salary for the rest of my time doing this job, which is 7 years and 4 months. But in my view, it's worth it," Comey said.

The incident began when the FBI requested Apple's access to the iPhone of the San Bernardino terrorist attacker, subsequently drawing public attention to the fact that technology companies refuse requests from investigative agencies.

In early April 2016, Comey revealed that the FBI had purchased "a tool" from a private company but would not be further developing the services offered.

Comey also stated that the FBI has no intention of continuing to hire outside companies for similar cases due to cost reasons, and that it will be "part of the job of FBI agents" in the future.

Comey shared that the FBI would try to find a reasonable technological solution that doesn't involve cracking the code or spending a large sum of money each time the organization encounters a new encryption challenge.

The iPhone that the FBI successfully unlocked belonged to terrorist Syed Farook. Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, belonged to an extremist Islamic group supporting the Islamic State (IS) and carried out the December 2015 terrorist attack in San Bernardino that killed 14 people. Both killers later died in a shootout with US police.

Thanh Hien

(According to CNN)