RIM co-CEO
Mike Lazaridis has made some pretty
bold statements in the past, but he may just have topped himself in responding to the recent issue of countries
banning or
threatening to ban BlackBerrys -- to which you can now add Indonesia to the list. Speaking with
The Wall Street Journal in what's described as a "fiery" interview, Lazaridis said that "this is about the Internet," and that "everything on the Internet is encrypted. This not a BlackBerry-only issue," before adding that if "they can't deal with the Internet, they should shut it off." But that's not all. Lazaridis further went on to saying that "we're going to continue to work with them to make sure they understand the reality of the Internet," noting that "a lot of these people don't have Ph.Ds, and they don't have a degree in computer science." Despite those statements, however, Lazaridis seems confident that the situation will get sorted out, saying that it "will get resolved if there is a chance for rational discussion."
posted August 4th 2010 10:39PM
@bobbyvassallo oh well, I guess we should ask Canada to limit export trades to them then..
Lol I love RIM's press releases. They have some balls, unlike a lot of other companies.
I say bravo to blackberry for standing up and telling these countries to shove it
I don't understand why the industrialized world as a whole stands up and says knock this kinda stuff off. Why is the world doing business with countries that are oppressive and have massive firewalls to keep their citizens in check. This goes for china as well. Heres a tip if you do not like what your citizens are going to say about some law or policy you put in place then perhaps you should not put it in place! I applaud rim and any other company that puts their foot down and says enough is enough. More companies should follow suit.
@macfan64 cool, lets wall the gardens, man the towers, no more global trade.. every country for themselves..
@cuz84d That's not what he's saying... at all... he's saying we should not do business with corrupt oppressive lying nations like China.
interesting that only muslim countries are banning blackberries
i thought isal was the religion of peace and tolerance?
@Seawolf not the extremists.. they don't think like that.. many muslims are peaceful and get along with the rest of the world fine, but countries are still breeding extremists all over middle east and asia.. they live and die by false teaching from their forefathers and they don't know any different, too bad, they don't realize, it only gets them farther away from the only one true God..
@Seawolf
This has nothing to do with religion. It's about corrupt government officials wanting to easily eavesdrop on business transactions for stock tips. It's all about money.
@Seawolf
A company should respect the wishes of the country/state/city they want to do business in or leave plain and simple. You know how things go down there before you step foot in by learning about the place and its culture and if you choose to sell your products there with knowing this information its only your fault.
They should know about the views of morality, security, religion etc in the place they want to set up shop beforehand. Your supposed to find out info on your market and that includes the government there to determine if it is a good place to sell your products in.
What does a Blackberry have to do with peace and tolerance. Blackberry is an object that is not human nor animal so what does being peaceful to it mean.
I'm waiting for RIM to say that the USA or Canada does not have access to their servers
I wonder if they want the security secure ATT Blackberries like Obama has..
This is far from racism, he's not talking about the people he's talking about the beaurocrats and politicians who have ulterior motives to spy on their people.
@Mr Deux yup, the oldest trick in the book
based on Indonesia Ministry of Communication and Information tweet http://twitter.com/tifsembiring/status/20321927537 there is no plan to block Blackberry
Kudos to RIM for standing firm on its ground.
As for these contries who cannot and will not respect privacy, you can just shove it.
I have first hand experience in these countries. Worked a few years in UAE and K.S.A. What can I say about their governments, they can't walk the walk, just talk and talk. BS!
@Toink Would you think there is any privacy in the USA, Canada, UK, Australia, etc.? Nope.. their governments spy on the people just as much as Saudi Arabia and UAE.
dude reminds me of Steve Case right after AOL bought Time Warner...
Oh the government around the world do intend to shut the internet off. ACTA. Game over.
Shouldn't this be a "CE Oh No He Didn't!"
I'm very very ashamed just because these unprogressing statements originate from the country I was born (I'm Greek, and he's too.)
the best part in this story when USA blame others for the ban and spy at Americans in the same time.
go Americans you are number one on every thing even in stupidity.
Damn don't give the governments such ideas. There are many politicians in many countries that will take that statement as a challenge and try and get the internet banned or heavily filtered like the Chinese have it.
@tpbftw
You'll be surprised. More and more countries are setting up their own big firewall. Oh, and there's ACTA. It's not a challenge, it's already in process.
What does he think he is smarter than people in countries like India.There is a genuine security threat because of Blackberry services and he is not helping the government on it.
Blackberry has helped the US government in security matters but it is not helping the so called third world countries.
He is big racist and Blackberry should be banned in all countries where security is a big issue.
@Kaps2K6
there is a big difference from saying we want to spy on so and so for so and so reasons to we want access to the entire network to spy at will...
"will get resolved if there is a chance for rational discussion."
You'll find a leprechaun's pot of gold first I'm guessing.
he's right... if the Gov't can't deal with the internet, then just GTFO
Go head Mike, insult everybody. It's the best way to do business.
Today, you can add Euro Deputies dumbass and their 32.000 employees who now aren't authorised to use Black Berry.
They're so stupid they can't understand how it's safe and confidential to let all their emails pass through your servers in Canada.
Will you PhD help you to be kick out pretty soon? I don't think so.
@Haldaar
to be NOT kick out...yeah, yeah I know.
1- Apple have hard respect time to their customers, he talk to countries like that even
2- he disappoint many of experts and computer engineers in those countries, they will promise will not buy his BB.
3- he give control to another countries and his talking is not balance with that.
4 - what ppl do not know internet, r u from this plant???
5- he feel the greatness and forget the respect and try to keep the money by bad way.
6- ppl there hate you because they understand what their government ask for and they understand more than you think or you learn.
7- they ask for what you already provided for another countries.
8- your company it will go down, you will see because your accent is not good and you have no respect.
@am0oma WTF did you just say? No, seriously. Did you Babelfish that whole post?
I guess all of you who are supporting RIM in this would have reacted differently if 9/11 was carried out using blackberry phones. India's worst recent terror attack dubbed as 26/11 has been carried out on blackberry phones. Intelligence agencies recovered blackberry phones from each and every terrorist in the siege and discovered that most of the comm was on BBM and email both which are encrpyted by BB. Had the government had access to all these messages a lot of lives and plunder could have been saved. 175 families lost their loved ones.
Im a big BB fan but I dont mind dumping for the cause of national security. The US has access to real time BBM and email data. Anybody who thinks not will probably say Tupac and Biggie Smalls are also alive.
JMO
@slicksilver
Many terrorist activities involve car. All the IEDs and suicide bombers in Iraq were transported in vehicles. Perhaps if the government were to restrict car ownership and freedom of travel then all there would not have been so many innocent individuals.
In all seriousness, if they didn't use Crackberries, then they would have used some other form of secure communication such as freely available e-mail encryption. Heck, you can even encrypt text messages if you want. Do you support banning all mobile phones too?
@Twitchy
Goddam I hate it when my browser auto corrects - I've got to learn to start proofreading my posts.
Many terrorist activities involve cars. All the IEDs and suicide bombers in Iraq were transported in vehicles. Perhaps if the government were to restrict car ownership and freedom of travel then all there would not have been so many innocent individuals killed.
In all seriousness, if they didn't use Crackberries, then they would have used some other form of secure communication such as freely available e-mail encryption. Heck, you can even encrypt text messages if you want. Do you support banning all mobile phones too?
As a person who has lived in Indonesia for a long time, I personally feel amused that this country just keeps on repeating this sort of groupie mindset whenever another country with predominantly moslem population puts a ban on something.
Let's just put it this way: I am pretty sure that almost all of the members of the House of Representative (an equivalent of Parliament in the UK or Congress in the US) are using BlackBerries. Even though BB's domination in the US is slowly waning, it is still very popular in Indonesia. Anybody who could afford it usually owns one or two. Otherwise there are always those knockoffs usually sold by a Taiwanese/Chinese brand.
Is it actually logical to ban BlackBerries in Indonesia; or is it just one of those sleighs of hand that is being forced upon a foreign company in order to build a localized RIM server, free of charge? Otherwise, you could always bribe someone in the upper echelon of power so that this issue would not be discussed again whenever the House assembles to discuss and pass regulations.
i was expecting the comments to this article to be a hotbed of fiery factions angrily exchanging arguments about freedom of speech and national security. it's curiously tame in here, like us gadgeters aren't really moved one way or the other. the android smartphone selling well article on the other hand has ~1000 comments on it!
Nothing can change the minds of officials in Saudi or UAE or even Indonesia. The only thing Lazaridis can do is bow down to their demands or they will never allow even the sale of BB devices.
These people don't need to be educated by Mike about the Internet which by the way is not entirely encrypted. I see many more countries from that region banning BB's.
His phones are behind the times and so are his comments....
"goverments"? ... not to be a total jerk but do you have anybody read anything you post without proofreading it or a spell check? its government dummy
Disrespectful? Maybe a little. Rude? Not necessarily. Correct? I think so. If those governments want to subsidize a new BB server farm closer to their million dollar homes, then more power to them. But location of servers doesn't necessarily have anything to do with security in this completely networked world.
How much does anyone want to bet that Canada, USA, UK, Mexico, Australia, France, Germany, Russia, Japan, and Brazil already do this.
I'm willing to bet that each of these countries have a agency or department of a agency set up to do exactly what the UAE, KSA & India want.
@Xoy
every government agency can request to spy on any particular person RIM will grant any request. The difference here is that they want total access to spy at will with out needing request from RIM...big difference...
Translation: If we can't do business there...then it would be better for us if our competitors couldn't either.
@ RymeMaster I believe Mike Lazaridis is secretely the CEO of Lamood Big Hats http://www.lamoodbighats.com with a big head like that.
Amen!
You guys don't get it. This is not about controlling terrorists in Saudi Arabia. Let's put it this way, if you use your Blackberry in the United States to tell your neighbor's wife that you want to meet her in a motel for an affair, the FBI does not care. Do that in Saudia Arabia, and the Religious Police will monitor you and take you out for a beating and the woman for a stoning.
The Internet is dead, welcome to the Grid - http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/article3689881.ece