To install server for authorities to check user’s data.
Research In Motion (RIM) and Saudi Arabia reached an agreement that would allow Blackberry services to continue in the country after the government was given the ability to monitor messages, the Associated Press said today.
The deal involves installing a server inside Saudi Arabia that will let authorities check Blackberry users’ data, averting a ban on the service, the AP said. It cited a Saudi regulatory official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorised to discuss the details of the accord with the media.
Saudi Arabia had said on August 3 that it would order the country’s three mobile-phone operators to shut off BlackBerry instant messaging starting yesterday. RIM and the three carriers were making progress in trying to find a solution acceptable to authorities, two people familiar with the discussions said earlier. They asked not to be identified since the negotiations weren’t completed.
“The BlackBerry has become indispensable for the business community in Saudi Arabia and the region,” said John Sfakianakis, chief economist at Banque Saudi Fransi in Riyadh. Blocking services would be “a disruption to the business flow and productivity,” he said.
RIM, based in Waterloo, Ontario, faces growing scrutiny over its BlackBerry e-mail and messaging services in countries including the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and India. Indonesia, the world’s fourth most-populous nation, also expressed concern about BlackBerry services.
A solution
The US and Canadian governments said earlier this week they were in talks with foreign governments to find a solution.
Satchit Gayakwad, a spokesman for RIM in India, didn’t immediately reply to questions sent by e-mail today. Spokesmen for the company at agencies in the UK, in the US and in the Asia-Pacific region didn’t respond to questions sent by e-mail. Calls to the UK and Asian representatives weren’t answered.
The US government is discussing a proposed ban in the UAE with that country’s government, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said earlier this week at a press conference. Canadian Trade Minister Peter Van Loan told reporters his country’s officials were working with RIM and foreign governments to find a solution to disputes over the device.
Sultan al Malik, a spokesman for the Communications and Information Technology Commission, Saudi Arabia’s telecommunications regulator, and Etihad Etisalat Co, the service provider known as Mobily, didn’t respond to e-mails today. The official Saudi Press Agency hasn’t issued any statements on the matter.
Ordered to stop
The country’s wireless operators include Saudi Telecom Co, Mobily, and the local unit of Kuwait’s Mobile Telecommunications Co, known as Zain KSA. The carriers were ordered to stop messaging services after a yearlong consultation with RIM failed to bring BlackBerry functions into line with Saudi Arabia’s telecommunications laws, the regulator said this past week.
“There is a legitimate security concern,” Clinton said, “but there’s also a legitimate right of free use and access.”
Turkey’s telecommunications regulator yesterday said there are “serious” security weaknesses related to Blackberry services in the country, adding that it has set up a committee to look into the matter.
