RIM to allow Messenger monitoring in India

By agreeing to government demands RIM could alienate CIOs

The Indian government has agreed to allow RIM's BlackBerry Messenger service to continue after the 31 August ban but the future of the firm's enterprise email services remains in doubt.

A report on Reuters claims that BlackBerry maker met with the Indian government today and agreed to provide manual access to BlackBerry instant messages by 1 September, and automated access by year-end.

In addition, at least three mobile operators have received letters from the Indian Department of Telecommunications telling them to put in place monitoring capabilities for Messenger and Enterprise email services.

"We have received a letter asking us to ensure that a legal intervention capability is put in place for BlackBerry services by 31 August 2010," said Tata Teleservices in a statement.

RIM has time and again maintained that it does not have the ability to hand over encryption keys to its BES services, however, which could yet remain a sticking point if the Indian authorities demand to be able to monitor the content of enterprise emails.

India is looking to take a hard line on terrorists in the run up to the Commonwealth Games there later this year.

A report in The Financial Times then suggested that the country will monitor Google, Skype and other communication services, citing concerns that they could be used for terrorist activities.

Other nations have made similar demands on RIM, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon and Kuwait.