RIM offers access to security agencies to its BlackBerry services

BlackBerry phone.

Canadian company Research in Motion (RIM) today offered to the Government of India lawful access by law enforcement agencies to its popular BlackBerry Enterprise Service (BES) and BlackBerry Messenger Service (BMS) a day before the end of the August 31 deadline set by the Government earlier this month.

The Government had, on August 12, made it clear that RIM would have to provide a technical solution to the security concerns about BES and BMS by August 31 or face a shutdown of these services.

Government of India have been having discussions with RIM, Canada over the last few weeks on the issue of lawful access by the law enforcement agencies to the communications passing through RIM systems," a statement from the Ministry of Home Affairs said.

"RIM have made certain proposals for lawful access by law enforcement agencies and these would be operationalized immediately. The feasibility of the solutions offered would be assessed thereafter," the statement said.

These decisions were taken at a meeting chaired here today by Union Home Secretary G K Pillai at which representatives of security agencies and the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) were present.

According to the statement, the DoT would also study the feasibility of all such services being provided through a server located only in India.

The Home Ministry has made it clear to all telecom service providers that any communication through the telecom networks should be accessible to the law enforcement agencies and all of them, including third parties, had to comply with this requirement.

The statement said the Home Ministry would review the situation within 60 days by which time the DoT was expected to submit its report.

The August 12 meeting, which was also chaired by Mr Pillai and attended by the security agencies and DoT officials, had taken note of the fact that the BlackBerry services like Voice, SMS and Blackberry Information Service (BIS) had been made available to the law enforcement agencies.

India is one of several countries which have in recent times asked BlackBerry to allow access to encrypted e-mail and instant messages. India is one of the key growth areas for RIM with one of fastest expanding mobile telephone markets, where it has more than a million customers.

RIM logo

The Government's worry is that encrypted services like those provided by RIM's BlackBerry services could be used by terrorists. The terrorists involved in the November 26, 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai and several other such incidents across India are known to have extensively used mobile and satellite telephones to plan and coordinate the attacks.

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Lebanon and Algeria are among the countries which have sought access to BlackBerry's encrypted services.

NNN