Ai tempi in cui FBI spiava Steve Jobs

Curiosa più che storicamente interessante la pubblicazione dei file intestati a Steve Jobs negli archivi FBI

Though sections have been redacted and more than two dozen interviews are narrated in dry officialese, the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s 191-page file on Steve Jobs, released Thursday, reveals numerous lively details about the Apple co-founder’s personal life and professional past, as recounted to FBI agents by his colleagues, neighbors and friends.

The document confirms much of what is already known about Jobs, including his drug use, spartan lifestyle and the intense managerial style that created friction between him and some of his colleagues. Yet it also sheds light on Jobs’ relationship with the government, revealing that he was given top secret clearance between 1988 and 1990 and was being considered by President George H. W. Bush’s administration for a position on the president’s Export Council. Much of the file consists of the 1991 background check the FBI performed in light of this prospective appointment.

Several pages of memos and handwritten notes also provide a glimpse into a $1 million bomb threat that was made against Apple on Feb. 7, 1985, several months before Apple fired Jobs.

“An unidentified male caller made a series of telephone calls to [redacted] of Apple computer Inc. […] and advised that ‘devices’ had been placed in homes of captioned individuals [redacted] and one million dollars must be paid,” the FBI wrote in a memo about the threat. The FBI noted that its probe of the areas targeted by the individual who made the bomb threat turned up no unusual activity.

At least 29 people were interviewed for the FBI’s background check, and although their names have been redacted, there are several clues hinting at their identities. For example, the FBI notes that it interviewed a “roommate” and attempted to contact a woman who “had a baby born out of wedlock,” presumably Chris-Ann Brennan, Jobs’ ex-girlfriend and the mother of his daughter Lisa.