Apple (AAPL, Tech30) declined to assist, saying that to do so would compromise the security of all iPhone users.
I'm pretty sure that both the FBI and Apple have directly said that a team of engineers was working with the FBI to come up with a solution. I'm also pretty sure that both have said that it was Apple who came up with discovery of the hole in the security that would permit loading a signed version of the OS, even on a locked phone, which would not wipe the phone.
What they declined to do was create a new version of the OS and digitally sign it.
So you might say this was a self inflicted wound; here's a way to do it, maybe, and due to the digital signature, we're the only ones in the world who can do it, but good luck getting approval.
I'm pretty sure it took, what, two or three hours before the suggestion was made here on FreeRepublic of the likely method used by the FBI and an outside company to copy off the data and eventually hack it.
Heck, McAfee was rather open in his offer to do it.
So, really, if I was a reporter inclined to characterize months of a dozen or more employees working directly with the FBI as 'declined to assist', why hasn't the obvious question been asked - Did Apple suggest using the method that you eventually paid another party to have done?
If they're going to continue with the narrative of a company which refused to help, I guess asking that question wouldn't further the narrative. It is a near certainty that they explicitly outlined the entire procedure from start to finish for how it could be done with the caveat that there is a chance, if something goes wrong, of corrupting the data. Whereas the software method wouldn't have that chance.
Why do I say that? Because the FBI hasn't arrested those engineers and filed charges against Apple for conspiracy to impede a federal investigation.
McAfee's approach was firmly anchored in the 1980s. . . he did not have a clue of what he was talking about.
Apple and their engineers have no duty to assist the FBI in their investigation. There is no law that compels them to do so. None. Not the All Writs Act or even a Search Warrant can do that. That was what the hearing was going to be all about. Apple won the hearing on that issue in New York before a Federal Magistrate Judge on that very issue. The Federal Government has no authority to compel anyone third party to comply with such a writ.