&gt;&gt;However, Apple is a neutral third party that holds information needed in an investigation.<p>No, they may have the technical ability to weaken a product they made, which may hold information needed in the investigation. They already provided the information they actually have access to (the iCloud backups).<p>If they are indeed forced to do this, I expect the market cap of AAPL will drop significantly (billions of dollars, most likely) to reflect the weakened security of their product. Is that a reasonable thing for the government to require of a neutral third party?