Is it legally acceptable that FBI knows about a criminal activity and do not act to stop it? A security vulnerability like this will sooner or later be used by criminals, and the FBI are in the authoritative position to prevent it. Could future victims sue the government for allowing the crime to occur? There have been many lawsuits where an ISP has been found guilty for knowingly host a copyright infringer on their network and not acting to prevent it, so it should not be too implausible that a government agency responsible to prevent crime is held to equal or higher standard.
Should police, upon seeing an unlocked car, promptly find the owner and inform them? Of course that's a nice thing to do as people, but it's not really a legal obligation.
It's more like, if the police identify an exploitable weakness in a bank vault, they tell the bank. Businesses and the FBI usually work together to increase the safety of the public. In this case, there is disagreement about how to keep the public the most safe.
The FBI does not understand that no government will ever be able to force all encrypted software to do key escrow with them. That misunderstanding is costing a heap of tax payer dollars and risking public safety.
If the police has reason to expect that the car will be the subject of a crime, then I think they should be legally required to act.
I know that in some places, the courts has ruled a police officer do not have a legal duty to protect citizens from harm or prevent crimes. Strangely, in places where citizens that witness a crime has a legal duty to report it, its unclear if the police has the same requirement.
But this is the FBI, so shouldn't they be held to a higher standard?
