FBI is trying to avoid saying how the San Bernardino iPhone was - CNET

The FBI spent over $1.3 million to unlock the iPhone of San Beardino shooter Syed Farook -- and reportedly found nothing important inside. Now, Apple wants to find out how the phone got , but the FBI doesn't plan to share.

According to The Wall Street Joual, the FBI will argue that it doesn't know enough about the mysterious third-party hack to even launch an inteal discussion about whether it should clue Apple into the details.

The Joual reports that an interagency group called the Vulnerabilities Equities Process panel might have decided to tell Apple if there were a security weakness it could fix, but only if the FBI reports that weakness to that group in the first place.

Speaking at a cybersecurity event in Washington, D.C. earlier on Tuesday, FBI Director James Comey suggested that such a disclosure might not be necessary. "The threshold is, are we aware of the vulnerability, or did we just buy a tool and don't have sufficient knowledge of the vulnerability to implicate the process?" said Comey, according to a report at Fortune.

You can find CNET's ongoing coverage of Apple vs. the FBI right here.