Well, this is a fun topic 
Here is what I think, which is a lot of opinion, with a dash education from my emergency and disaster management degree (lots of terrorism related classes), and a look at history. Also tempered for being an American (if that matters).
1. The phone is a county government phone that was assigned to Farook. It is highly doubtful that any real actionable intelligence is on this phone (consent to monitor would have been a part of the agreement to use the phone on the governments dime) as he most likely used a burner phone of some sort for communication (if they actually had any other helpers/planners). I think a burner phone is likely since they took the pains of destroy some items (including other phones I believe) in their home and throw out their computer's hard drive, as well as trying to remove their digital presence online prior to the attack.
2. The people Farook would have called on the iPhone would have been tracked by their phone's service provider, and the FBI should already have this info.
3. Just about any info that may be on the phone will not be actionable because anyone who was associated with them would have gone to ground back in early December and are long gone (unless they are stupid, which is always possible, but I am going to give them the benefit of the doubt of having some competence).
Ok, now why I think any legislation for a backdoor to be required on electronic equipment is a terrible idea.
1. History. Look at the Patriot Act, and now the Freedom Act. The vast majority of the provisions have not been used to fight terrorism, but used on the greater "war on drugs". When you delve deeper into any anti-terrorism law, it is immediately used by law enforcement around the country to identify, monitor, and bust suspected drug criminals. If Apple and others are forced to created backdoors, you can bet that law enforcement will use it for any crime they can pin on individuals (Stingray scanners used by local police departments for example). Also proliferation of this backdoor info throughout the agencies and law enforcement will mean that it will be easier for hackers to obtain this information, never mind other more repressive regimes.
2. The intelligence and security apparatus of the US is in the business of lying to US citizens in order to "keep us safe from terrorist acts" (see James Clapper's testimony to Congress over the NSA intelligence collecting. He also has a history of lying about other intelligence subjects).
3. The intelligence and security agencies will use any excuse to broaden their surveillance, even though it has been proven that the amount of data they collect is so vast that they literally can not find terrorists, so they are constantly asking for more budget from Congress in order to increase the number of agents, and build bigger data centers to help sift through all the data they collect. I guess they believe at some point that they will perfect some algorithm that will pin-point terrorist communications, despite the fact that most of the successful terrorist attacks since the fall of the Soviet Union were conducted by individuals who were on various agencies radars prior to the attacks. It was the bureaucracy, agency competitiveness and lack of communication, shifted priorities, and yes, even some institutional incompetence that permitted these attacks to occur successfully, not the lack of red flags that indicted those individuals should be investigated.
I don't want to come off as some paranoid conspiracy theorist I have just grown more suspicious of the US government, and especially the intelligence and security agencies over the past decade-and-a-half when they insist that they need to reduce everyone's privacy over security concerns about terrorism. Just realize the "war on terror" is a forever war. There will always be terrorism and the government can not stop every attack regardless of how much surveillance they want to enact. Should Americans fight tooth and nail for their privacy rights? I think so. -A
Here is what I think, which is a lot of opinion, with a dash education from my emergency and disaster management degree (lots of terrorism related classes), and a look at history. Also tempered for being an American (if that matters).
1. The phone is a county government phone that was assigned to Farook. It is highly doubtful that any real actionable intelligence is on this phone (consent to monitor would have been a part of the agreement to use the phone on the governments dime) as he most likely used a burner phone of some sort for communication (if they actually had any other helpers/planners). I think a burner phone is likely since they took the pains of destroy some items (including other phones I believe) in their home and throw out their computer's hard drive, as well as trying to remove their digital presence online prior to the attack.
2. The people Farook would have called on the iPhone would have been tracked by their phone's service provider, and the FBI should already have this info.
3. Just about any info that may be on the phone will not be actionable because anyone who was associated with them would have gone to ground back in early December and are long gone (unless they are stupid, which is always possible, but I am going to give them the benefit of the doubt of having some competence).
Ok, now why I think any legislation for a backdoor to be required on electronic equipment is a terrible idea.
1. History. Look at the Patriot Act, and now the Freedom Act. The vast majority of the provisions have not been used to fight terrorism, but used on the greater "war on drugs". When you delve deeper into any anti-terrorism law, it is immediately used by law enforcement around the country to identify, monitor, and bust suspected drug criminals. If Apple and others are forced to created backdoors, you can bet that law enforcement will use it for any crime they can pin on individuals (Stingray scanners used by local police departments for example). Also proliferation of this backdoor info throughout the agencies and law enforcement will mean that it will be easier for hackers to obtain this information, never mind other more repressive regimes.
2. The intelligence and security apparatus of the US is in the business of lying to US citizens in order to "keep us safe from terrorist acts" (see James Clapper's testimony to Congress over the NSA intelligence collecting. He also has a history of lying about other intelligence subjects).
3. The intelligence and security agencies will use any excuse to broaden their surveillance, even though it has been proven that the amount of data they collect is so vast that they literally can not find terrorists, so they are constantly asking for more budget from Congress in order to increase the number of agents, and build bigger data centers to help sift through all the data they collect. I guess they believe at some point that they will perfect some algorithm that will pin-point terrorist communications, despite the fact that most of the successful terrorist attacks since the fall of the Soviet Union were conducted by individuals who were on various agencies radars prior to the attacks. It was the bureaucracy, agency competitiveness and lack of communication, shifted priorities, and yes, even some institutional incompetence that permitted these attacks to occur successfully, not the lack of red flags that indicted those individuals should be investigated.
I don't want to come off as some paranoid conspiracy theorist
I have just grown more suspicious of the US government, and especially the intelligence and security agencies over the past decade-and-a-half when they insist that they need to reduce everyone's privacy over security concerns about terrorism. Just realize the "war on terror" is a forever war. There will always be terrorism and the government can not stop every attack regardless of how much surveillance they want to enact. Should Americans fight tooth and nail for their privacy rights? I think so. -A
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