[JURIST] The US Department of Justice (DOJ) [official website] on Monday requested a postponement [motion, PDF] of a hearing scheduled for Tuesday to determine whether Apple must comply with an order to unlock the San Bernadino shooter’s iPhone. The DOJ stated that they may have another method to unlock the shooter’s phone and therefore would not need Apple to comply wit the order. They asked for a postponement in order to test this new method.

In a separate case this month a judge for the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York denied a DOJ request to order Apple to disable the security of an iPhone that was seized during a drug investigation. At the end of February Apple filed [JURIST report] a brief in the US District Court for the Central District of California in opposition of the US government’s request for the company to unlock the iPhone of San Bernardino shooter, Syed Rizwan Farook. Counsel for Apple called the case “unprecedented” after the DOJ filed [JURIST report] a motion to compel Apple to unlock the encrypted iPhone. In response to the legal conflict, Apple asked [JURIST report] the US government to create a panel of experts to discuss issues of security versus privacy. These developments came after Apple refused the initial court order to assist the government in unlocking the iPhone from one of the San Bernardino shooter. The court order required [JURIST report] Apple to supply software to the FBI to disable a self-destruct feature that erases phone data after 10 failed attempts to enter the phone’s password.