Recently a number of governments have threatened to ban Research in Motion's BlackBerry services if the company does not make encrypted BlackBerry data and other content available to state authorities . A major concern of these regimes is that BlackBerry data can be encrypted and routed through servers located outside of their jurisdictions. Unconfirmed reports have circulated that RIM has made data sharing agreements with India, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates. Other countries are also requesting the company locate data centres within their jurisdictions.
This Web site is a research project designed to gather information on how traffic exits the BlackBerry network depending on the country in which the user is located. The findings from this project will be published and made publicly available. This project is being conducted by the Information Warfare Monitor and the Web site is maintained by the (Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto).
For further reading see:
Ron Deibert, Cyberspace Confidential, August 6 2010, Globe and Mail
Full RIM customer statement on BlackBerry security issues
This Web site automatically collects the following data when you visit the page:
-Internet Protocol Address
-User agent
In addition to the automatic collection of data, we would appreciate your help in manually inserting more data. Using the drop down menus provided, please select the country in which you are presently located, the type of Blackberry service you are using (enterprise or consumer), and the nature of the your connection (data or wifi). You also have the option of submitting any additional comments you think might be relevant in the comments field.
Modifying your browser settings will assist in our data collection. To do so, please follow these steps: