The UK government has ordered Apple Inc. to build a backdoor to give it access to global user data, in a move that could spark one of the biggest privacy fights in the iPhone maker’s history.

Britain has ordered Apple to give it unprecedentedly broad access to encrypted user data stored on Apple's data cloud, the Washington Post newspaper reported on Friday.

Not only is Apple unable to either confirm or deny that it has been told to create this back door, but the UK Home Office will not do so either. Making this worse, while Apple can appeal the demand, it can only do so in a secret court and must deliver the demanded access even before that appeal is heard.