Inside the BlackBerry Workaround

pillageplunder writes "Businessweek has a pretty good FAQ-style article on the proposed workaround that RIM would implement if a judge upholds an injunction." From the article: "It would work by changing the part of the network where e-mails are stored. Right now, when someone is out of wireless coverage range and can't immediately get e-mail access, RIM's service stores incoming messages on computers at one of its two network operations centers, or NOCs. When you come back into coverage range, those e-mails are forwarded to you automatically. "

Comments

Re:Why not store at the client end anyway?

[arivanov]

This will mean the blackberry server talking to the operator which in practice means the customer talking to the operator. The operators will not like it.

The main reason for BB success is the fact that RIM talks to the operator, not the customer. As a result the operators have considerably less security hassle and most importantly no billing disputes. So no matter how much they dislike RIM they prefer to deal with them.

While at it, I have always asked myself the question - is the encryption end-to-end or the messages are stored at RIM unencrypted. Or what are the possibilities for RIM to successfully escrow a key? After all all registration, pins, etc goes through it... All of the governmentcritter email in cleartext (or easily decryptable)... Interesting thought...

Another example of what patents really do

[Chemisor]

In another stunning example, the patent office is once again proven to be not the receptacle of revolutionary ideas or the catalyst of innovation, but rather the repository of ideas nobody is allowed to think any more. Or needs to.