UAE to suspend some BlackBerry services
The United Arab Emirates on Sunday decided to suspend some of the BlackBerry services like messenger, e-mail and web-browsing from October 11, days after India asked the Canadian firm to offer monitoring facility citing security concerns. The suspension is a result of the failure of ongoing attempts, dating back to 2007, to bring BlackBerry services in the UAE in line with local telecommunications regulations, state-run news agency WAM reported on Sunday. It quoted the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority as saying that BlackBerry Messenger, BlackBerry E-mail and BlackBerry Web-browsing services in the UAE will be suspended as of October 11. Both telecommunications operators in the Emirates, Etisalat and du, have been informed of the decision. The notification was delivered with an instruction to ensure minimal consumer disruption in the provision of alternative services, the WAM reported. Etisalat has sent a text to its 145,000 BlackBerry users explaining the situation. Du said it would 'fully comply' with the TRA's move. All BlackBerry services fall within the UAE regulatory framework developed by the TRA since 2007, however because of BlackBerry's technical configuration, some services operate beyond the enforcement of these regulations, the TRA stated. BlackBerry data is immediately exported offshore, where it is managed by a foreign, commercial organisation. BlackBerry data services are currently the only data services operating in the UAE where this is the case, WAM 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 for the UAE, it said. Commenting on the announcement, TRA director general Mohamed Al Ghanim said: "With no solution available and in the public interest, in order to affect resolution of this issue, as of October 11, 2010, BlackBerry Messenger, BlackBerry Email and BlackBerry Web-browsing services will be suspended until an acceptable solution can be developed and applied." Ghanim said, "The TRA notes that BlackBerry appears to be compliant in similar regulatory environments of other countries, which makes non-compliance in the UAE both disappointing and of great concern." In June 2009, a separate row erupted between Research in Motion - the makers of Blackberry handset - and the state telecoms firm Etisalat after which it released an "update" for the Blackberry handset that, said RIM, was spyware. While 50 per cent of the UAE's population has some kind of internet access, authorities have imposed extensive filtering on what they can view. India has asked RIM that its email and other data services must comply with formats that can be monitored by intelligence agencies, following which the Canadian firm gave an assurance on soon addressing New Delhi's concerns.
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