Apple and Google ask Obama to leave smartphone security alone

FBI director James Comey has asked Congress for help getting around the upgraded encryption on Apple's smartphone, something he believes is creating too high a hurdle for law enforcement. It's not clear if his calls for new legislation have much chance for success, but they are clearly causing ripples in Silicon Valley. In a letter obtained by The Washington Post, tech heavyweights like Apple and Google call on President Obama to reject any new laws that would weaken security.There have been laws kicking around Congress for a while that would create the kind of backdoors Comey and other security hawks have been pushing for. CALEA II is one such bill, but it trips over all the outsized fears about government surveillance that the public has long held, even more so in the wake of Edward Snowden and revelations about just how much of our everyday communication is being vacuumed up by the NSA.As we wrote back in October of 2014, that means "Comey's left exactly where we started, making ominous noises and generating headlines favorable to the FBI, but not actually doing anything. It's a bluff, a way to nudge public opinion without committing the bureau to anything. This isn't a crypto war — it's a pageant."So why the letter from Apple and Google today? Maybe this is just another volley in an ongoing debate. Or perhaps, as candidates from both parties eagerly line up for the 2016 presidential election, this is a message to an aspiring @POTUS about where some of the wealthiest and most politically active tech giants in the US are focused.