&gt; if the 10x-wipe retries counter is unencrypted, it will be broken by third-parties<p>It can&#x27;t be encrypted with the same key as the rest of the harddisk, or it wouldn&#x27;t be possible to increase it on a failed decryption attempt. But even if it is, you can always restore a previous state from backup.<p>To be honest, I still don&#x27;t understand who the FBI can&#x27;t brute force it (other than the time it would take), and how Apple&#x27;s assistance could possibly help, if the encryption was done well.