Feds Ask Judge To Cancel Tuesday Hearing In Apple's Challenge To Order

Two New York Police Department (NYPD) officers stand gaurd during a demonstration outside the Apple store on Fifth Avenue in New York on February 23, 2016.

Jewel Samad / AFP / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Federal lawyers on Monday afternoon asked a judge to cancel a hearing scheduled for Tuesday on Apple's challenge to the order issued by the court that it help the government access an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters.

The heavily anticipated hearing is slated to cover arguments briefed over the past month by Apple, the Justice Department, and a host of other parties before Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym over Apple's challenge to Pym's order that the company help the federal government access the iPhone used by Syed Rizwan Farook.

On the eve of the arguments — and hours after an Apple product launch event — the government told the court that "a possible method for unlocking" the phone was demonstrated to the FBI by "an outside party."

The government is asking for the hearing on Apple's challenge to the order to be canceled, with the government to update the court on whether the new method is "viable" by April 5.

From the Justice Department filing:

This is a developing story.

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