&gt; <i>and at worst an implication that Apple intended at some point to comply with government requests for encrypted information</i><p>Apple&#x27;s backdoor is for straightforward business reasons - they want to retain digital ownership of people&#x27;s devices to take a cut from app distribution. Plus, keeping control is <i>harder</i> than giving up control. Keeping control allows total flexibility, like the flexibility to undermine security that&#x27;s under discussion. Removing control requires careful planning to avoid later problems with no flexibility to fix them.