[kictanet] blackberry a threat to national security?.......U.A.E. Puts the Squeeze on BlackBerry

[Alice Munyua]

  U.A.E. Puts the Squeeze on Black Berry

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748704702304575402493300698912.html

Government Cites National-Security Concerns as It Bans Email, IM and Web 
Services in Battle Over Access to User


By MARGARET COKER in Abu Dhabi, TIM FALCONER in Dubai and PHRED DVORAK 
in Toronto

BlackBerry email, instant-messaging and Web-browsing services soon will 
be banned in the United Arab Emirates, regulators said, citing a dispute 
with the device's maker about how it handles electronic data.

The U.A.E. market is relatively small for Canada's Research In Motion 
Ltd., which makes the BlackBerry smartphone. But the suspension of data 
service comes amid unease by at least one other government, India, over 
the inability to monitor or review electronic communications on the 
device in criminal, terrorist or national-security investigations.

And a Saudi Arabian official said Sunday that regulators there ordered 
telecommunications companies to block BlackBerry IM services later this 
month, according to Zawya Dow Jones. The official didn't explain the 
decision.

At the heart of the battle is access to the data transmitted by 
BlackBerrys. RIM processes the information through a handful of secure 
Network Operations Centers around the world, meaning that most 
governments can't access the data easily on their own. The U.A.E. 
worries that because of jurisdictional issues, its courts couldn't 
compel RIM to turn over secure data from its servers, which are outside 
the U.A.E. even in a national-security situation, a person familiar with 
the situation said.

The U.A.E. ban is the latest in a string of skirmishes world-wide for 
RIM as governments try to monitor and control communications. Kuwait, 
India and China are among countries that have asked RIM for easier data 
access as a condition for operating within their borders.

The U.A.E. ban, due to start Oct. 11, was the result of the "failure of 
ongoing attempts, dating back to 2007, to bring BlackBerry services in 
the U.A.E. in line with U.A.E. telecommunications regulations," the 
country's Telecommunications Regulatory Authority said Sunday. The ban 
doesn't affect telephone and text-messaging services.

"BlackBerry data is immediately exported offshore, where it's managed by 
a foreign, commercial organization. BlackBerry data services are 
currently the only data services operating in the U.A.E. where this is 
the case," the agency said. "Today's decision is based on the fact that, 
in their current form, certain BlackBerry services allow users to act 
without any legal accountability, causing judicial, social and 
national-security concerns."

RIM, based in Waterloo, Ontario, didn't comment on the U.A.E. ban.

The U.A.E. acted after RIM refused to set up a proxy server in the 
country as required by its 2007 contract with telecom provider Emirates 
Telecommunications Corp., a majority of which is owned by the 
government, according to the person familiar with the situation.

RIM last month offered to allow the government access to the 
communications of 3,000 of its roughly 500,000 U.A.E.-based BlackBerry 
clients, including email, text messages and IM communications, the 
person said. But the U.A.E. declined the offer, the person said.

The government doesn't plan to ban smartphones made by the company's two 
global competitors, Nokia Corp. and Apple Inc., said one of the people 
familiar with the situation.

RIM, which has about 46 million subscribers world-wide, is unusual among 
cellphone makers in that BlackBerrys, which were initially designed for 
corporate users, come with a high level of security built in. The 
messages are encrypted on the device before being sent and remain 
encrypted until they reach their destination. The messages are processed 
at one of RIM's Network Operations Centers, the principal one of which 
is in Canada. The NOCs use proprietary technology, making it difficult 
for outsiders to hack in.

Smartphones from other companies don't have the same centralized control 
over email or data transmissions and don't come preloaded with the same 
level of propriety security technology as Black Berrys do.

The centralized structure makes BlackBerry communications more secure, 
said Jonathan Zittrain, a professor of law and computer science at 
Harvard University. But the structure also creates a tempting target for 
governments, which see the possibility of getting access to a large pool 
of information through RIM, he said.

And while RIM cooperates with governments on requests for 
national-security-related data that pass through its servers, it can't 
be forced to relinquish information from servers that aren't in a 
particular government's jurisdictions, Prof. Zittrain said. A government 
has more leverage if the servers are within its borders.

"If you've got a NOC there, the government can say 'We're shutting down 
the power. We're posting guards at your door,' " Prof. Zittrain said.

Another person familiar with the matter said a key worry for U.A.E. 
officials was that BlackBerry's IM service was effectively untraceable. 
That could be a problem if RIM resisted handing over data sought by the 
U.A.E. "If the U.A.E. government needs this information, for criminal 
cases, they are unable to access it because the culprits used BlackBerry 
messenger service," the person said.

A senior Indian official last week said BlackBerry's encryption makes 
monitoring of its network impossible and creates a security threat. The 
Indian government, which is negotiating with RIM, has warned the company 
that its operations will be closed unless the company addresses the 
concerns.

The U.A.E.'s carriers—Emirates Telecommunications, known as Etisalat, 
and Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Co.—said they would comply 
with the ban.

The ban is the latest twist in a long-running battle between the U.A.E. 
and RIM. Last year, RIM notified BlackBerry users in the nation that an 
application Etisalat had told its clients was a technical upgrade was 
actually spyware. Users who downloaded the patch had complained of 
disruption in email and other services. Etisalat subsequently offered 
directions on disabling the software.