The threat to the BlackBerry Messenger service in India has passed – at least for the moment – but other mobile services are now being disrupted as a result of security concerns.
It’s reported that the Indian Department of Telecommunications has told Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices to close all 3G services that can’t be monitored. These two companies are the country’s first privately-owned mobile networks to launch 3G services, although the state-owned telecoms companies launched 3G in 2009. As a result, RCom and Tata have both discontinued their 3G video call services.
Trade body AUSPI (the Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers of India) is quoted as saying live monitoring of video calls isn’t possible and also noting that the state-owned networks aren’t facing the same restrictions.
[Sources: The Hindu Business Line; WirelessFederation.com; Business-Standard.com]