Apple, The FBI And iPhone Encryption: What's At Stake

Remember the cryptex, the little handheld safe from The Da Vinci Code where entering the correct combination will reveal the secret message and entering the wrong one will destroy it?

Now replace the little safe with an iPhone, and instead of a secret message, it's holding evidence in a terrorism case. The critical combination? It's a passcode — one the FBI doesn't know, and one that Apple is reluctant to help the agency figure out.

Of course, it's more complicated than that. Here are a few key questions and answers about the dispute between the tech giant and federal investigators:

Whose phone are investigators trying to access?

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