The US government has told US Congress that iPhone encryption is a "vicious guard dog" that hurts national security, while Apple says it is critical to protecting privacy against hackers.  As the debate over built-in iPhone encryption has deadlocked in the courts, law enforcement and the world's second-largest mobile phone maker agreed on one point on Tuesday: it's up to Congress to set boundaries in the fight over who can legally access a person's digital life.  "We're asking Apple to take the vicious guard dog away and let us pick the lock," FBI director James Comey told a House judiciary panel, referring to a locked iPhone tied to the deadly December shooting in San Bernardino, California.  "The FBI is asking Apple to weaken the security of our products," Apple general counsel Bruce Sewell later countered.  Tuesday's hearing shifted attention from the courts - where judges in the past month have issued conflicting opinions - to Congress, where both sides say the broader policy debate belongs.  Apple's recent opposition to bypassing security features for the government has pushed that dispute from tech circles into the mainstream.  The strong positions on Tuesday make clear the deep divide between Silicon Valley and the government, even as the Obama administration advocates open dialogue and resolution.  "Is it the right thing to make our society overall less safe in order to solve crime?" Sewell asked. "That's the issue that we're wrestling with."  The San Bernardino case involves an iPhone 5C owned by San Bernardino County and used by Syed Farook, who was a health inspector there.  He and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, later died in a gun battle with police.  The FBI wants specialised software that would bypass security protocols on the encrypted phone so investigators can test random passcode combinations in rapid sequence to access its data.  Republican Darrell Issa of California asked Comey whether the FBI had first asked Apple for the underlying iPhone software before trying to force the company to create its own digital workaround.  Issa suggested the FBI had not exhausted its own efforts before the government went to court.  Comey said he had "high confidence that all elements of the US government" had been focused on this problem, and that Apple had never suggested an alternative to resolve the problem.  House judiciary chairman Bob Goodlatte said technology was moving toward newer generations of encryption and security, and "we're going to have to figure out a different way to help law enforcement".  Alex Abdo, a staff lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union's speech, privacy and technology project, told the Associated Press the larger debate was "ultimately about whether we trust our devices".  "If the government prevails, then there is nothing to stop it from turning every major tech company into a tool of government surveillance," Abdo said.
A US judiciary committee hearing between Apple and the FBI over the locked iPhone of a California shooter has begun.