明天，苹果公司将在美国东部时间下午1点，总法律顾问布鲁斯·苏厄尔（Bruce Sewell）向众议院司法委员会作证。这是苹果公司接到命令打破与圣贝纳迪诺袭击事件有关的**安全措施后，首次在国会露面，苏厄尔可能面临持怀疑态度的人群。曼哈顿地区检察官塞勒斯·万斯（Cyrus Vance）也将加入他的行列，他一直直言不讳地批评公司的加密政策，还有一些众议院代表过去一直是联邦调查局立场的坚定支持者。联邦调查局局长詹姆斯·科米也将出席委员会的会议，不过他将出席另一个小组的会议。

苏厄尔今天早些时候向小组提交了他准备好的开幕词，全文转载如下：

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Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's my pleasure to appear before you and the Committee today on behalf of Apple. We appreciate your invitation and the opportunity to be part of the discussion on this important issue which centers on the civil liberties at the foundation of our country. I want to repeat something we have said since the beginning — that the victims and families of the San Bernardino attacks have our deepest sympathies and we strongly agree that justice should be served. Apple has no sympathy for terrorists. We have the utmost respect for law enforcement and share their goal of creating a safer world. We have a team of dedicated professionals that are on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year to assist law enforcement. When the FBI came to us in the immediate aftermath of the San Bernardino attacks, we gave all the information we had related to their investigation. And we went beyond that by making Apple engineers available to advise them on a number of additional investigative opti***. But we now find ourselves at the center of an extraordinary circumstance. The FBI has asked a Court to order us to give them something we don’t have. To create an operating system that does not exist — because it would be too dangerous. They are asking for a backdoor into the iPhone — specifically to build a software tool that can break the encryption system which protects personal information on every iPhone. As we have told them — and as we have told the American public — building that software tool would not affect just one iPhone. It would weaken the security for all of them. In fact, just last week Director Comey agreed that the FBI would likely use this precedent in other cases involving other phones. District Attorney Vance has also said he would absolutely plan to use this on over 175 phones. We can all agree this is not about access to just one iPhone. The FBI is asking Apple to weaken the security of our products. Hackers and cyber criminals could use this to wreak havoc on our privacy and personal safety. It would set a dangerous precedent for government intrusion on the privacy and safety of its citizens. Hundreds of milli*** of law-abiding people trust Apple’s products with the most intimate details of their daily lives – photos, private conversati***, health data, financial accounts, and information about the user's location as well as the location of their friends and families. Some of you might have an iPhone in your pocket right now, and if you think about it, there's probably more information stored on that iPhone than a thief could steal by breaking into your house. The only way we know to protect that data is through strong encryption. Every day, over a trillion transacti*** occur safely over the Internet as a result of encrypted communicati***. These range from online banking and credit card transacti*** to the exchange of healthcare records, ideas that will change the world for the better, and communicati*** between loved ones. The US government has spent tens of milli*** of dollars through the Open Technology Fund and other US government programs to fund strong encryption. The Review Group on Intelligence and Communicati*** Technology, convened by President Obama, urged the US government to fully support and not in any way subvert, undermine, weaken, or make vulnerable generally available commercial software. Encryption is a good thing, a necessary thing. We have been using it in our products for over a decade. As attacks on our customers’ data become increasingly sophisticated, the tools we use to defend against them must get stronger too. Weakening encryption will only hurt c***umers and other well-meaning users who rely on companies like Apple to protect their personal information. Today’s hearing is titled Balancing Americans’ Security and Privacy. We believe we can, and we must, have both. Protecting our data with encryption and other methods preserves our privacy and it keeps people safe. The American people deserve an honest conversation around the important questi*** stemming from the FBI’s current demand: Do we want to put a limit on the technology that protects our data, and therefore our privacy and our safety, in the face of increasingly sophisticated cyber attacks? Should the FBI be allowed to stop Apple, or any company, from offering the American people the safest and most secure product it can make? Should the FBI have the right to compel a company to produce a product it doesn't already make, to the FBI’s exact specificati*** and for the FBI’s use? We believe that each of these questi*** deserves a healthy discussion, and any decision should be made after a thoughtful and honest c***ideration of the facts. Most importantly, the decisi*** should be made by you and your colleagues as representatives of the people, rather than through a warrant request based on a 220 year- old-statute. At Apple, we are ready to have this conversation. The feedback and support we're hearing indicate to us that the American people are ready, too. We feel strongly that our customers, their families, their friends and their neighbors will be better protected from thieves and terrorists if we can offer the very best protecti*** for their data. And at the same time, the freedoms and liberties we all cherish will be more secure. Thank you for your time. I look forward to answering your questi***.