India To Ban BlackBerry Services Starting August 31

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Canada’s Research in Motion (RIM) and their BlackBerry Internet Services (BIS) have come under fire recently in a number of Asian countries. The United Arab Emirates has already blocked BIS, turning BlackBerries into expensive featurephones. Likewise, Saudi Arabia had blocked the phone for a few hours before reaching an agreement with RIM. Now, the Indian government has joined the movement by announcing they’ll block the service unless demands are met.

India prides itself on being a very forward-thinking tech-centric country, but even their government wants the so called ‘skeleton key’ to RIM’s servers. For those out of the know – all BlackBerry e-mail, web and BB Messenger traffic is routed through servers owned by RIM. It’s apart of how they’re able to deliver such a great e-mail experience – and the security and turnkey ease of it is how RIM made their bed.

But, due to national security concerns – many of these countries are unhappy with the majority of RIM’s servers are held in Canada – outside of the jurisdiction of the local authorities.

RIM folded and installed some local servers in Saudi Arabia – but it’s a slippery slope for the Canadian tech giant. In addition to the easy e-mail service, RIM’s reputation is built on solid-security. The governments of the United States, Canada and UK commonly issue BlackBerry phones to high-level officials – and the leader of the free world, President Barack Obama even carries a highly-secured BlackBerry device.

RIM wants access to these emerging markets. But – they don’t want to compromise the security that they’re known for. RIM has until August 31 to comply with India’s demands. The Indian government, according to Reuters, is sure that RIM will meet them before the deadline.