WASHINGTON — The FBI director Thursday criticized the decision by Apple and Google to encrypt smartphones data so it can be inaccessible to law enforcement, even with a court order.

James Comey told reporters at FBI headquarters that U.S. officials are in talks with the two companies. He accused the companies of letting people put themselves beyond the law’s reach.

Comey cited child-kidnapping and terrorism cases as two examples of situations where quick access by authorities to information on cellphones can save lives. Comey did not cite specific past cases that would have been more difficult for the FBI to investigate under the new policies, which only involve physical access to a suspect’s or victim’s phone when the owner is unable or unwilling to unlock it for authorities.

Both Apple and Google announced last week that their new operating systems will be encrypted, or rendered in code, by default. Law enforcement officials could still intercept conversations but might not be able to access call data, contacts, photos and email stored on the phone.

Even under the new policies, law enforcement could still access a person’s cellphone data that has been backed up to the companies’ online-storage services. They also could still retrieve real-time phone records and logs of text messages to see whom a suspect was calling or texting, and they could still obtain wiretaps to eavesdrop on all calls made with the phones.

Comey’s criticisms closely tracked complaints earlier this week by Ronald T. Hosko, a former FBI assistant criminal division director who wrote in The Washington Post that Google’s and Apple’s policies would have resulted in the death of a hostage in a recent North Carolina kidnapping.

The newspaper subsequently corrected Hosko’s claims after concluding that the new encryption systems would not have hindered the FBI’s rescue of the kidnap victim in Wake Forest.