Apple <i>can</i> decrypt the phone -- once they remove the bruteforce protections, it would be trivial for them to bruteforce the typical small phone unlock keyspace.<p>The FBI hasn&#x27;t asked for this since they can trivially do it themselves, but Apple could certainly do it if they wanted to.<p>And if they are forced into creating this hack, then the next request will be to force them to decrypt the phone too since once manufacturers can be coerced into doing anything that the government demands in a warrant, what restriction would prevent the government from asking for full decryption?<p>Bruteforce protection doesn&#x27;t mean giving up on a 6 digit passcode, it means making the hardware security module completely hardware only with no way to alter software (or at least unalterable without the unlock code), and with too many brute force tries, the <i>hardware</i> wipes it&#x27;s copy of the key, which is essentially the same as wiping the disk, but it can&#x27;t be intercepted by an IOS software change. For added security, it could have a timer so if the phone is not unlocked in X number of days, it wipes its key so if someone steals your phone, it&#x27;s completely unrecoverable after X days.