Apple launches fresh legal challenge against UK encrypted data access demand
The filing comes a year on from the U.K. dropping an initial demand for access to British and American user data from Apple.
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Apple has launched a fresh legal challenge against a U.K. government attempt to access encrypted data held by British customers.
The move comes a year on from the previous dispute between the two over a request from the U.K.'s Home Office for both British and American customer data. That order was dropped by the U.K. after interventions from U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance.
Apple confirmed the filing of the legal challenge to CNBC, but declined to comment further. The Home Office said it does not comment on legal proceedings or operational matters, including confirming or denying the existence of individual notices.
"The UK supports strong encryption and robust privacy protections, but it is also vital that law enforcement can access communications when necessary and proportionate to protect the public from terrorism, serious crime, and child sexual abuse," a Home Office spokesperson told CNBC.
"The Investigatory Powers Act is world-leading legislation that helps keep people safe while protecting privacy through strong safeguards and independent judicial oversight."
'Transatlantic row'
Britain's Home Office, which handles immigration and security, in early 2025 issued an order to Apple requiring a technical "backdoor" that would allow officials to view fully encrypted material uploaded to the cloud software.
Former U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said in August last year that the U.K. had dropped the request after interventions from Trump and Vance.
But the Home Office demanded in September that Apple provide access to British citizens' encrypted data, the Financial Times reported.
After the initial request from the U.K. government, Apple disabled its Advanced Data Protection (ADP) in the U.K. to new users. Current U.K. users will eventually need to disable this security feature, the company said in a statement in September.
"We are gravely disappointed that the protections provided by ADP are not available to our customers in the UK given the continuing rise of data breaches and other threats to customer privacy," Apple said at the time. "As we have said many times before, we have never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products or services and we never will."
"The original demand caused a transatlantic row because it extended to American users," Andrew Fremlin-Key, partner at law firm Withers, specialising in media, reputation and information disputes, told CNBC.
"Restricting the new notice to British users may reduce that conflict, but it is unlikely to eliminate US concerns about a foreign government requiring an American company to weaken the security of its technology."
