This comes as a shocker. The United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia have imposed a ban on Blackberry access to the internet, IM and emails. The reason behind the ban is the lack of communication monitoring capabilities for Blackberries, which is crucial for their national security.
The ban will take effect this month in Saudi Arabia and October for UAE. According to state controlled Saudi Telecom, the move is to pressure RIM to release user communication data when needed. Currently, Blackberry’s service encrypts data that’s sent out from devices directly to servers located outside UAE and Saudi Arabia. To date, there’s about 500,000 Blackberry users in UAE and 400,000 in Saudi Arabia.
So far RIM has yet to respond but we never know if they would actually comply by giving both nations exclusive access to user data.
So take note if you’re planning to travel to the middle east with a Blackberry soon.
