Clove Technology’s Blog

The saga with BlackBerry devices being banned in the Middle East has been ongoing for a while, but it now looks like Saudi Arabia is close to reaching an agreement with RIM. BBC News reports Saudi officials as saying a deal is ‘”in sight”, so it looks as though it will not reach the point where handsets are banned completely.

The problem has arisen in Saudi Arabia and UAE due to the encryption system used by RIM. Basically, messages sent using BlackBerry services (e-mail, BB messenger, web browsing) are encrypted and stored on servers in Canada, the home of RIM. Because of this, third parties are not able to monitor data sent over the network.

This is not a new issue by any means and negotiations have been ongoing between RIM and some Gulf states for 3 years now. However, it seems the threat of a ban in some Gulf countries has occurred as the negotiations have failed to reach an outcome. The growth in popularity of BlackBerry devices in UAE and Saudi Arabia could also have contributed to authorities feeling the need to take action.

While other Smartphone services, such as Gmail and other web-based mail systems, also encrypt their data, RIM is the only firm that automatically sends its data to overseas servers, making it impossible for authorities to monitor content.

In relation to allowing access to its data, RIM has said that it:

‘does not discuss ongoing regulatory discussions ongoing with any one government, but they did say that they often meet the needs of governments, corporations and consumers’ (TFTS).

However, RIM has allowed other governments, such as the US, to gain access to data for some years with the correct court orders. It is also rumoured that the firm has come to agreements with the Russian and Chinese governments in the past, making it slightly confusing previously as to why it couldn’t agree terms with UAE/Saudi Arabia.

As a result of the failure to reach an agreement, BlackBerry devices were due to be banned in Saudi Arabia in Friday and it was reported that the use of some services did go down for about 4 hours. However, according to reports it now seems likely that a deal is likely that will allow authorities to decipher exchanged messages.

This is good news for the estimated 700,000 BlackBerry users in Saudi Arabia, as well as the 400,000 users in UAE. The UAE has said it will ban BlackBerry services in October, but if the deal with Saudi Arabia does materialise, there’s a good chance something similar could arise for UAE.

Via BBC News