San Bernardino phone data sheds light on attack timeline: report

The government has discovered data on an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters that has helped rule out outside coordination with ISIS supporters, CNN reports.

The information has made investigators more convinced that the two shooters — Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik — did not have outside help from friends and family, according to CNN, which cited unnamed U.S. law enforcement officials.

{mosads}In particular, the phone showed that Farook did not contact anyone or use encrypted communications during an 18-minute window after the shootings. The FBI had said it is largely unsure what the attackers did during that time.

The phone also displayed no evidence that Farook had been in touch with other supporters of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), according to CNN.

The FBI said the device has helped investigators discount several possibilities that it could not have ruled out otherwise.

The locked iPhone had been at the center of a standoff between the FBI and Apple for weeks, after the agency sought a court order directing the tech giant to help unlock the phone.

Apple rebuffed the order, arguing that complying would undermine its security and expose millions of other iPhone users to hackers.

The FBI eventually dropped its request after third-party hackers offered an alternative method of cracking the phone that didn’t require Apple’s assistance.