RIM Looks to Avoid India BlackBerry Ban

Earlier this month, India's Ministry of Home Affairs demanded that RIM allow Indian law enforcement access to Blackberry Enterprise Service and Blackberry Messenger Service data by Aug. 31, or officials would block BlackBerry services in the country.

Indian officials say they need to be able to intercept BlackBerry messages in cases where they suspect the devices are being used to plot terror attacks or other crimes. RIM, for its part, insists that encryption is in its users' hands and that it does not have technology that would allow third-parties to monitor BlackBerry traffic.

"In order to provide corporate customers with the necessary confidence that the transmission of their valuable and confidential data is completely secure, the BlackBerry security architecture for enterprise customers was purposely designed to exclude the capability for RIM or any third party to read encrypted information," RIM said. "RIM would simply be unable to accommodate any request for a copy of a customer's encryption key since at no time does RIM, ever possess a copy of the key."

The BlackBerry smartphone maker has about 1.1 million users in India out of a total subscription base of 46 million worldwide, said Mike Abramsky, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets in Toronto.

Saudi Arabia Back Away From Threat to Ban BlackBerry

Aug. 10. The Saudi government backed away Tuesday from a threat to shut down the BlackBerry corporate messenger service in the country, citing progress in talks with operators and the maker of the device, Research In Motion, over the ability to monitor encrypted messages for national security reasons.

The country let a second deadline -- set for midnight last night -- pass without shutting BlackBerry Messenger. The decision gives Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM and the kingdom’s three wireless companies more time to implement a technical fix that will let the service meet local laws, state-owned Saudi Press Agency said, citing the telecommunications regulator.

The Saudi government added that it decided to allow the BlackBerry messenger services as it "continues to work with service providers to complete the remainder of the regulatory requirements," according to the Journal.

The fracas has spread as far as India, where the Ministry of Home Affairs said Tuesday it has called a meeting with the country's telecommunication service providers Thursday to discuss the security concerns regarding the BlackBerry smartphones' encryption.

UAE to Suspend Blackberry Service From October

The United Arab Emirates will suspend use of Blackberry services in October, citing concerns about security risks, the state news agency said on Sunday.

The UAE said it would halt Blackberry services until an "acceptable solution" is developed and applied.

The U.A.E. government last week said Research in Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry was a potential threat to national security, while an Indian government official said Indian security agencies have raised unspecified concerns about BlackBerry services.

Etisalat will soon announce a range of alternative products and services for its existing BlackBerry customers, the company said in an e-mailed statement today.

BlackBerry services may be banned in India unless the Canadian company agrees to resolve security concerns, a government official with direct knowledge of the matter said July 29. India has told Research In Motion to set up a proxy server in the country to enable security agencies to monitor e- mail traffic, according to three government officials, who declined to be identified as the information is confidential.

BlackBerry Curve 9300 coming soon

The rather unexciting BlackBerry Curve 3G 9300 rumoured to be going to T-Mobile, Verizon, Bell, and Rogers will be finding its way to Vodafone UK around Q3, if this source of this internal document is to be believed. BlackBerry OS 5.0.0.832 has been approved, so it seems unlikely that the Kepler will be launching with anything as exciting as OS 6, which is too bad, since the 9300 seems like a real snoozer so far.

As for the specs, the 9300 comes with a 3.2 megapixel camera, memory expansion using microSD cards up to 32GB, HSDPA, WLAN: Wi-Fi 802.11 b / g and support for Bluetooth v2.1 with A2DP. We're still clueless as to when this would make its official appearance.

Not much is known about the device at the moment, although Engadget confirm that the 9300 Curve will have a 3.2 megapixel camera. We imagine that this handset will be aimed at the low-end market, so it should be available for a pretty good price.