FBI Director James Comey said Tuesday he was glad a court fight in California over access to a locked iPhone had ended because it "was creating an emotion around the issue that was not productive," likening the rhetoric and passion surrounding the discussion to the debate over gun control. Though in the bigger picture, Comey said the conversation would certainly persist given that there are "plenty" of cases affected by encryption. The Justice Department last week said that it would continue trying to force Apple to reveal an iPhone's data in a New York City drug case.

Comey added that one of the "unintended benefits" of the Apple case has been greater public dialogue and engagement about the balance between privacy and security. But he said he hoped "some of the emotion would come down" and that the dialogue was not well-served by "being tweeted about" or being spoken of in absolutes.

Comey's commentary somewhat mirrored that from President Obama back in March when he stated that "My conclusion so far is that you cannot take an absolutist view on this. So if your argument is: strong encryption no matter what and we can and should in fact create black boxes; that I think, does not strike the kind of balance that we have lived with for 200-300 years and its fetishizing our phones above every other value and that can't be the right answer."

Lastly Comey stated that "We can't resolve these really important issues that affect our values — technology, innovation, safety and all kinds of other things — in litigation." You could read more about this on ABC News.

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