Google's Indian-American chief executive Sundar Pichai sided with rival Apple in its battle over a court order to help the FBI access information on the encrypted iPhone used by a Pakistani-American shooter in San Bernardino.

Pichai in February directed followers to Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook's open letter arguing that helping the FBI try to get into the phone used by Syed Rizwan Farook would sabotage the security of "tens of millions of American citizens." Farook and his Pakistani origin wife, Tashfeen Malik, gunned down 14 people at a social services agency Dec 2 in San Bernardino, California, before being killed in a shootout with police. FBI Director James Comey said that investigators still haven't been able to get at the information on Farook's iPhone 5c.

A Riverside, California court directed Apple in February to help FBI crack the phone by developing software to hack into one of its own devices.