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Blackberry Gives India Access To Servers

Posted by timothy on from the good-thing-we-can-trust-governments dept.

Meshach writes "As happened earlier in Saudi Arabia Blackberry has reached a deal that allows Indian authorities access to the transmissions of hand held devices. Much of the fear comes from worries about terrorists: Pakistani-based militants used mobile and satellite phones in the 2008 attacks that killed 166 people in Mumbai."

23 of 182 comments (clear)

  1. How long... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How long before every country decides that in order to allow RIM to operate they need to open up their servers?

    1. Re:How long... by Jazz-Masta · · Score: 5, Funny

      How long before every country decides that in order to allow RIM to operate they need to open up their servers?

      Monday.

    2. Re:How long... by davester666 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Of course, there are only a billion or so trivial ways to privately communicate using a public network, from one-time pads, to stenography [in text, images, video, or other binary files], to using ssh, or https.

      And for all you higher and mightier Americans using IMAP, I'm sure you know the police can request any email, without a warrant, for any email stored on a server for more than 180 days (and now believes that they can also get any email stored on the server for less than 180 days if you've read it) http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/04/emailprivacy/ I wonder if GMail has a portal that lets the police do this or if they just forward all email to the FBI as it passes 180 days...

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    3. Re:How long... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      Just curious how any government would go about decrypting a 128 bit RSA message in real time? Was there an article proving P == NP while I wasn't paying attention?

    4. Re:How long... by chrb · · Score: 4, Insightful

      How long before every country decides that in order to allow RIM to operate they need to open up their servers?

      The vast majority of countries with cell networks already have laws in place that require cell providers to enable lawful intercept of calls and messages. RIM were an anomaly because they provided no lawful intercept capability to these countries. Now, they do.. RIM devices in the USA and EU are already subject to lawful intercepts - these moves are just providing the same capability to other nations.

  2. Gag order by traindirector · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The better question may be "where has this already happened with a gag order attached to the request?"

    1. Re:Gag order by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'll tell you:

      uA)u2j2la*jh2o(*&seH uj* jj3&m*j3hH

      (and, yes, someone at RIM has just run that thru their indiaFilter() and are laughing at the joke. sorry, I can't explain it to you.)

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
  3. Phfft. by kylemonger · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This is like banning box cutters on planes because the 9/11 terrorists used them, as if terrorist can't figure out how to enocde their messages in other ways. Terrorism isn't the reasons for this, repression is.

    1. Re:Phfft. by Ziekheid · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Terrorism has become the best argument for invading privacy nowadays.

    2. Re:Phfft. by Hognoxious · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I can't help but wonder - how? (especially "many")

      Plenty, since the TSA extended the definition of box cutters to include nail clippers, pencils & baby milk.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    3. Re:Phfft. by zbyg · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Terrorism and pedophiles has become the best argument for invading privacy nowadays.

      FTFY

  4. Oh, I get it ... by kbahey · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Oh, I get it now ...

    If it is Saudi Arabia and the UAE, it is all about censorship ...

    But if it is India, it is a move against the terrorists ...

    It is all about spin ...

    --
    2bits.com, Inc: Drupal, WordPress, and LAMP performance tuning.
  5. Corporate reactions will come... by Tjp($)pjT · · Score: 4, Insightful

    By overtly giving access to these governments they can scan for US or European business partners (hopefully RIM limits to the local to that country traffic). This allows them an unfair competitive advantage as they can then direct local companies often state owned or controlled to change bids or marketing approaches. Saudi Arabia this might apply to leveraging better prices from suppliers or from gaining a better advantage in the financial sector, and in India it means they can now cherry pick information related to manufacturing deals to gain advantage over the people looking for competitive bids between India and other outsource manufacturing (and outsource software development).

    This is not good. Corporations should strongly consider if RIM is a viable solution at this point.

    --
    - Tjp

    I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!

  6. Excuse for corporate espionage, really by Gopal.V · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I know RIM is only providing meta-data on the content, but honestly, are you telling me that this *wont* be used to spy on a corporate competitor?

    India is corrupt in a very "Who me?" way. This law has only abuses, in a country where you can buy a SIM for 5 dollars, with a photocopy of just about anybody's id. The terrorists don't need to bother with the BB or anything even remotely expensive - the underworld maybe (The D Company), but not the "kill them all and let God sort them out" category of terrorists.

    But it's not like India is the first place to do this. Echelon was used similarly, I guess to spy on foreign firms.

    --
    Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
  7. Other modes of communication by ricky1962 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    They can always go back to using number stations on the shortwave bands. Just a thought.

  8. Re:Story should be titled ... by plover · · Score: 4, Funny

    How about "Another RIM job for Blackberry Users"?

    --
    John
  9. The United States by KingSkippus · · Score: 4, Informative

    Can you believe the unmitigated nerve of those crappy little backwards countries and their oppressive Big Brother-ish monitoring of their citizens!!? Thank god nothing like this could ever happen in the United States, where we actually give a rat's ass about protecting our privacy from the government!

    Oh, wait... Well, shit.

    1. Re:The United States by bhagwad · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm an Indian. And I don't think the loss of privacy is worth the few lives that terrorism takes. The chance of me dying in a terrorist attack is lower than me being struck by lightning. To answer your post, there are some sacrifices that are worth it. And this is one.

  10. No, obviously you don't get it. by sdnick · · Score: 4, Informative

    India actually did get hit recently by Muslim terrorists who received intelligence, coordination and orders from neighboring Pakistan over mobile phones for several days as they moved through Mumbai targeting non-Muslims and racking up a body count of 166.

    Saudi Arabia and the UAE didn't suffer any recent attacks coordinated and made possible by mobile phone technology, and both have historically been far more willing to curtail free speech than India (which isn't anywhere near US standards for free speech itself).

    RIM should have hung tough and refused India's request, but at least India had a legitimate reason to ask. "All about spin" - yeah, darn that annoying reality and how it gets in the way of the narrative you prefer.

    1. Re:No, obviously you don't get it. by beh · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Ah - and decrypting the messages would have solved the problems, as it is phyiscally impossible to write plaintext 'in-code' AND encrypting it?

      The whole thing is bloody nonsense - if I were to plan any attacks, I certainly wouldn't just trust the encryption by a mobile provider as my 'safe haven'...

  11. Re:Niggers by Ironhandx · · Score: 4, Interesting

    and they made my decision on which smartphone to get when my Blackberry Storm kicks the bucket a whole lot easier. One of the reasons I went with them was because of their relative integrity when it comes to my information. If that practice is going out the window then my business just went out the window for them as well, and I'm certain I'm not alone.

  12. Are you sure it's *securely* encrypted? by Xenographic · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Verizon has delegated enough authority to let the UAE write SSL certificates impersonating any site which will get automatically accepted by most browsers, so don't you think it's getting hard to know if your communications are actually secure from eavesdropping?

    Part of the problem of secure communications is that there are too many governments who don't want people to have them because people can (and do) plot nefarious things with them.

  13. Not true - it happend long back (2002 !) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The difference between US and India is that with Indian authorities this was released to the press. US instead puts a gag order and then probably gets everything they want.
    NSA probably has a back room in blackberry - or has the encryption codes itself.. !

    "Despite what we are hearing, and considering the public track record of this administration, I simply do not believe their claims that the NSA's spying program is really limited to foreign communications or is otherwise consistent with the NSA's charter or with FISA," Klein's wrote. "And unlike the controversy over targeted wiretaps of individuals' phone calls, this potential spying appears to be applied wholesale to all sorts of internet communications of countless citizens."

    One of the documents is titled "Study Group 3, LGX/Splitter Wiring, San Francisco," and is dated 2002. The others are allegedly a design document instructing technicians how to wire up the taps, and a document that describes the equipment installed in the secret room.

    Read More http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/04/70619#ixzz0wavMN6aB"