Apple Challenges UK Government's Demand for Encrypted User Data Access

Apple is challenging another legal demand by the U.K. government to access the encrypted data of its users in the country, according to Financial Times. The company reportedly filed a complaint with the U.K.’s Investigatory Powers Tribunal, a court that hears cases related to government surveillance, after the government last year issued a “technical capability notice.” The notice is a secret government legal order for demanding access to users’ data, even if the data is encrypted. For critics, this kind of demand is the equivalent of requesting a backdoor into Apple’s cloud backups that have Advanced Data Protection (ADP) switched on, which makes the data end-to-end encrypted and inaccessible to anyone other than the customer, including Apple. This new challenge comes a year after a similar fight between Apple and the U.K. government. In early 2025, London issued a secret order to Apple demanding access to users’ encrypted iCloud backups, which was later dropped following the intervention of the Trump administration. After the first order, the company reacted by removing the ability of U.K. users to use ADP. Then, in October, the U.K. issued a second order, which Apple is now challenging. Apple did not respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment.