BlackBerry Makes Privacy and Control Subscription in BBM Free

BlackBerry, on Monday, announced it is making all the privacy features in BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) messaging app free to use. Prior to the announcement, the Canadian company charged $1 monthly premium subscription for the advanced privacy and control features. From the company's blog post: These enhanced privacy and control features give users full ownership over what they share through BBM -- even after it leaves their phone. With "Retract," users can retract messages and pictures from recipients they sent mistakenly or no longer wish to make accessible. "Timer," meanwhile, gives users control over how long their contacts can view shared messages, pictures, or location information.

Comments

Except for....

[Lumpy]

The servers where BB gave the local government the keys to everything.....

This mostly sounds like BB trying like hell to stay relevant.

Re:Except for....

[bobstreo]

The servers where BB gave the local government the keys to everything.....

This mostly sounds like BB trying like hell to stay relevant.

Less than trying to stay relevant, more like trying to stay in business, and not declare chapter 11 or 7 (or whatever the Canadian Equivalent is)

http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=B...

Incompetent or lying, pick one

[Just Some Guy]

These enhanced privacy and control features give users full ownership over what they share through BBM -- even after it leaves their phone.

...unless the recipient uses the notorious hacker tool known as "the screen shot". Seriously, either the blog author is too non-technical to be writing about such things or they're OK with flat-out lying to their readers.

If someone can write a Blu-ray ripper, they can trivially keep copies of any other data you send them. Once information has left your device, it is no longer "yours" in any meaningful sense. Implying anything else is flat-out deceptive.