The Department of Justice may find more support among Americans than Apple in the government's battle with the tech giant, according to a new survey from the Pew Research Center.
Fifty-one percent of people surveyed said that Apple should assist the FBI in attempts to access an iPhone 5C used by San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook. Thirty-eight percent said the company should not helps agents access the device, and 11 percent did not respond with an opinion, according to Pew.
When it came down to iPhone owners, 47 percent said Apple should help out the FBI, while 43 percent said it shouldn’t due to security concerns.
Read More: Tim Cook on FBI Fight: Apple Has No 'Sympathy for Terrorists'
Apple and the FBI have been engaged in an increasingly public battle that began in court documents and has erupted onto the national stage since last Tuesday.
FBI Director James Comey wrote in a blog post on Sunday that decisions about the conflict between technology and security “should not be resolved by corporations that sell stuff for a living,” nor decided solely by the FBI. Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote in a letter to employees on Monday that he had received messages of support from across the country.
And people are definitely talking about the story: Seventy-five percent of Pew respondents said they’d heard at least something about thehigh-tech spat, with 39 percent saying they’d heard a lot about it.
The Pew survey released on Monday was conducted between Feb. 18 and 21, days after a judge ordered Apple to assist federal agents in accessing the iPhone by building a tool that would circumvent restrictions on how many times a password can be entered into the device.
Read More: FBI Fires Back at Apple: 'We Don't Want to Break Anyone's Encryption'
