Technology News

Category: Technology News

BlackBerry sticks to its mobile security and privacy stand, despite pressure in Pakistan

Julie Campbell | December 4, 2015

The company has said that it would prefer to leave that country than to open its servers to authorities there.

BlackBerry Ltd. has announced that it will be placing its previous intentions to withdraw from its Pakistan operations on hold for the moment but that it will stand firm when it comes to maintaining the mobile security and privacy of its customers.

It continues to say that it will step out of its Pakistan operations if authorities there continue to demand access to its data.

The authorities in Pakistan have been demanding “unfettered” access to all of the customer data stored on the company’s BES servers. BlackBerry has been refusing to comply with these demands and had intended to close up its business there. While it has now said that it is delaying its withdrawal, it has added that it is not changing its position when it comes to the mobile security and personal and business privacy of its customers.

The Canadian smartphone maker has said that it will keep up its mobile security and Pakistan operations until December 30.

Mobile Security - Blackberry This extension is the outcome of a compliance extension that the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority issued to its original order that was created in July. The company had already been saying that it would not breach the privacy of its customers on the BES servers and that it would leave Pakistan rather than comply with the demands being made by those authorities. It had been required to provide full access to the server content of its BlackBerry Enterprise Service by November 30, though this has been extended by another month.

While it did say that it would be willing to work with the authorities in Pakistan in order to ensure that public safety remains protected, but that the mobile security and privacy of its customers are at the highest priority to BlackBerry and that it won’t give in or even compromise when it comes to opening up all access to the authorities in the country.

Marty Beard, the BlackBerry operations chief, explained that the company does know that it is vitally important to cooperate with a government’s lawful information request when it comes to detecting criminal activity, but that it never has and never will simply open up complete access to BlackBerry’s service.

Massive geolocation coverage project is underway in Belarus

BWild | December 4, 2015

By the end of the year, the goal is to have 85 percent of the country’s territory accurately covered.

According to a recent press release issued by the State Property Committee of Belarus, up to 85 percent of the territory of that country is going to have been covered by its precise geolocation system by the close of this year.

The press release explained that there will be additional tech put into place to accomplish this goal.

The intention is to add more continuously operating reference stations (CORS) to the country throughout the remainder of the year, for the purpose of increasing the total number to 90. This will make it possible to create geolocation coverage of up to 85 percent of the territory of the country. At the end of last month, the test operation of 17 of the CORS was brought to completion. Now that the testing phase is complete, they will be commissioned by the State Property Committee’s Belaerokosmogeodeziya enterprise.

The goal of this project is to provide accurate geolocation technology for a range of different purposes.

Geolocation Technology - Blearus For instance, the satellite technology development will provide geodesic measurements as well as navigation in the country and land surveying tools. That said, the primary goal of the location based tech service is to be able to use a global satellite precise positioning system in order to obtain the heights and coordinates of various specific locations to improve the accuracy and ease of land surveying projects.

In this way, it will become more efficient to determine land plot borders in fields, to identify boundary markers and to understand exactly where city limits reach. Moreover, it will also be helpful to local aerial photography centers in the region that require specific coordinates before they obtain the images they require.

The geolocation system that is being established in Belarus will be able to create coordinates with precision to within 1 to 5 centimeters. The design of the system is meant to offer data from the coordinates to a range of different registries, such as those used for forestry management, water management, city planning, territory planning and other forms of environmental survey, in addition to those responsible for precision farming, civil engineering and other operation types.