The White House is declining to offer public support for draft legislation that would empower judges to require technology companies such as Apple Inc. to help law enforcement crack encrypted data, sources familiar with the discussions said.
The decision all but assures that the years-long political impasse over encryption will continue even in the wake of the high-profile effort by the Department of Justice to force Apple to break into an iPhone used by a gunman in last December's shootings in San Bernardino, California.
President Barack Obama suggested in remarks last month that he had come around to the view that law enforcement agencies needed to have a way to gain access to encrypted information on smartphones.