Indian security agencies dissatisfied with RIM’s interception solution
The Indian government has announced that the country’s security agencies have expressed dissatisfaction over the solution provided by BlackBerry smartphone maker Research-In-Motion (RIM).
According to Minister of State for IT and Communications Sachin Pilot, for Blackberry Messenger (BBM) services, a solution has been offered by RIM but the Security Agencies are not satisfied with the solution.
The government has asked RIM to handover interception solution for its BlackBerry Internet Services (BIS), BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) and BlackBerry Enterprise Servers (BES) by January 31, 2011.
RIM later claimed it has given government solution to intercept BIS and BBM before the stipulated timeline but denied to have any solution to intercept BES.
According to Pilot, RIM has not yet given the solution for interception of their BlackBerry Enterprise Services (BES). According to RIM, they do not have any key for this service because communication offered through this service is dynamically encrypted.
The Minister mentioned the message in text can be obtained from Enterprise Email servers, where it is in readable format. Enterprise Email servers are deployed for corporate houses.
According to Indian Telegarph Act, 1885 and the licensing term and condition of telecom service providers, it is required for companies to provide Lawful Interception and Monitoring solution for any service they provide.
However, in case of Blackberry security agencies are only able to intercept voice (phone calls), SMS and BIS.
Telco operators to submit plans by month end(India)
The Indian Government has fixed March 31 as the deadline for all telecom operators to submit plans for interception of their services, including popular BlackBerry Enterprise Service (BES) of Research in Motion (RIM) and Skype by security agencies.
A senior official has stated that the home ministry has asked the Department of Telecommunication (DoT) to ensure that all telecom operators submit their plans by the end of this month on when they can provide access to all services, including BlackBerry’s BES, whenever there is a necessity for the security agencies.
He stated that DoT had been in contact with the telecom operators who, under their licensing agreement, were negotiating the details with the smart-phone service providers. The department would tell the home ministry about the deadlines, which would be final in terms of downloading certain software in mobile handsets itself to ensure interception. If they fail to give access, they have to put their services off in India. He explained that once the companies provide solution within the deadlines, the retrofitment or download of certain softwares in the handsets for legal interception would not be difficult.
The Centre will also put in place a security architecture for the telecom sector through which the government could put in a new facility to deposit open software in certain forms and new testing facility (labs).
RIM accepts India’s BlackBerry Demands
The Indian government has reached an agreement with RIM that will allow government agencies to pry on traffic originating from the BlackBerry Messenger Service. It’s a temporary solution, but as per the Indian government a permanent deal should be in place by Jan. 31, 2011.
India had threatened RIM to shutter the service if they don’t provide a permanent solution to the Indian government. From that point of time BlackBerry maker Research In Motion was struggling to find out a solution as if they fail they will be at a risk of losing access to a market of more than 1 billion people.
India and several other nations in Asia and the Middle East have expressed concern that terrorists can use texting services like BBM to carry out their activities, and without government monitoring; they might be able to do so unchecked. The United Arab Emirates came to a similar agreement with RIM a couple of weeks ago, although BBM wasn’t specifically mentioned.
RIM assures final Messenger solution by end-January: Indian government
As per the Indian government, Research In Motion(RIM) has set up a short-term arrangement for legal interception of BlackBerry Messenger services and has assured to provide a final solution by end-January. And according to government source, talks are still on over access to corporate emails.
India, among several countries had expressed concerns over BlackBerry services that could be used to stir political or social instability, and had threatened RIM with a ban if denied access to its highly secure Messenger and corporate email communications.
RIM had won a 60-day acquittal at the end of August after offering India a solution to monitor some BlackBerry data, a claim yet to be confirmed by the Canadian firm.
According to the statement by India’s interior ministry RIM had assured the government that they would provide the final solution for lawful interception of BlackBerry Messenger services by January 31. Accordingly, the BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) services will continue to be available.
India, the world’s fastest-growing mobile market, wants access to encrypted email traffic sent via RIM’s enterprise servers. As per the BlackBerry maker, its system is designed so that only the sponsoring business or organization has the technical capability to grant such access.
According to the Canadian firm, RIM can confirm that its discussions with the Indian government continue to be constructive and RIM remains optimistic about reaching a positive and final resolution.
Number portability roll-out to miss the deadline (India)
The mobile number portability has again became a question mark as Indian telecom operators to scuttle the launch of mobile number portability (MNP) and lack of will on the part of the government to ring in the new rule which has dashed all hopes of it becoming a reality from October 31, the government’s latest deadline for putting MNP in place.
MNP gives the opportunity to mobile subscribers to migrate to other operators while retaining their number within the circle. The MNP roll-out was initially to take place by December 31, 2009 in all the metros across the country. The deadline was later deferred to March 31, 2010 and then to June 30, 2010. The government had set October 31 as the latest deadline for the roll-out of MNP across all 23 telecom circles in the country.
MNP is now all set to get postponed for the fourth time in less than a year.
According to officials, MNP is expected to be pushed forward by two to three months. A government panel, which was expected to take a call on security clearance for US-based Telcordia Technologies Inc, which together with Syniverse Technologies Inc was supposed to roll out MNP pan-India from October 31 – has not met so far.
DoT had earlier issued a show-cause notice to Telcordia asking why its license for MNP should not be cancelled. Telcordia has been given time till the third week of October to respond to DoT’s notice, making the MNP roll-out almost impossible.
Telcordia Technologies received Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) approval for India’s MNP project in March last year.
But the home ministry revoked the clearance in August on security grounds as the company has operations in Pakistan.
Telcordia explained that it was only a software vendor for Pakistan operations and had no other business interests there. But the Indian authorities are not convinced.
As per Telecom officials, lobbies have been creating trouble for Telcordia Technologies Inc by raking up the issue of its operations in Pakistan. This was aimed at delaying the implementation of MNP.
BlackBerry’s suspension in UAE ‘finally’ averted
As per Mohammed al-Ghanim, director general of the country’s telecom regulator,, the United Arab Emirates’ deal with Research In Motion Ltd. that averted a suspension of BlackBerry smartphone services is finalâ€.
RIM’s pact announced on Oct. 8, which averted a ban planned for Oct. 11, cme after Saudi Arabia canceled a planned shutdown of BlackBerry services and the Indian government said it would push back a deadline to suspend BlackBerry services as it works toward a solution.
Al-Ghanim declined to provide further details.
RIM in positive discussions with India
Research In Motion Ltd. is in talks with the Indian government to allow interception and monitoring of its BlackBerry messenger , corporate email services and declares that it will continue to be constructive.
India was worried that terrorists could use BlackBerry’s highly encrypted software to communicate with the concealed BlackBerry corporate email services if RIM fails to come up with a solution for monitoring the service by the end of August.
India, who is in talks with RIM since the end of August, later extended the deadline for monitoring services by 60 days.
According to Indian Telecommunications Secretary R. Chandrashekhar, the government and RIM officials are in talks in order to find an appropriate solution to the issue.
India had warned that RIM would have to set up a server in India if it wishes to continue operating in the country. The Department of Telecommunications is expected to submit its report on using a local server by the end of October this year.
Sistema Shyam (MTS) to invest USD 55 Mn
Sistema Shyam TeleServices Limited (SSTL), a joint venture company between Russia’s Sistema and Shyam Group of India, will be investing USD 55 Mn to expand its code division multiple access (CDMA) network in one of the southern states in India (Andhra Pradesh) by the end of this year.
MTS India has successfully launched in 12 circles now and MTS India CEO, Vsevolod Rozanov, said the plan for this year was to complete all the 22 circles with an investment of over USD 1.1 Bn.
Currently, MTS India has 4.5 million subscribers, including 72,000 for high-speed data services. Data is the future of our company and is clearly a differential business model than other aggregators. We expect data services to account for one-third of our revenues and achieve break-even by 2013,†Rozanov told Business Standard in India.
Replying to a query, Rozanov said the company would switch to another vendor if China-based Huawei Technologies’ products were not allowed into India.
It may be recalled that the Indian government has blocked Huawei Technologies and ZTE Corporation from selling telecom network equipment to domestic phone carriers due to security reasons.
Indian govt extends pre-paid services in Jammu & Kashmir
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: A directive has been issued by the Indian government extending permission for the use of pre-paid mobile voice services in the Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) circle for a further twelve months. The legislation to use such services was due to expire on February 23, 2010.
After the review of those mobile operators which offer services in the region, the decision was taken ensuring that correct customer verification processes are being followed.
The terms of the permission include- the validity of SIM cards will not be beyond February 22, 2011; no pre-activated SIMs may be sold; recharge of SIMs within last three months of expiry of permission will not have validity beyond February 22, 2011; SIM cards will have no roaming facility outside J&K; service providers can appoint franchises only after seeking clearance from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT).
