Bill Gates, the on-again-off-again richest man in the world, said he was “disappointed” by a slew of reports saying that he supported the FBI in its legal battle with Apple.
He said, “That doesn’t state my view on this,” adding that he was “blindsided” by reports saying otherwise, according to an interview with Bloomberg.
“I do believe that with the right safeguards, there are cases where the government, on our behalf—like stopping terrorism, which could get worse in the future—that that is valuable,” Gates said in the interview. He didn’t fully back either Apple or the FBI, saying there should be a “discussion” on the matter, according to The Verge.
Earlier, Gates suggested that Apple has misconstrued its fight against the FBI’s request to unlock the iPhone of dead San Bernardino shooting suspect Syed Farook.
“It is no different than ... should anybody ever have been able to tell the phone company to get information ... should anybody be able to get at bank records,” the Microsoft founder told the Financial Times. “There’s no difference between information.”
