U.S. Government Now Seeking Access to Your BlackBerry E-mails

The U.S. government is now 'officially' seeking access to your encrypted BlackBerry e-mails. Federal law enforcement and national security officials are seeking a bill to require new regulations over the internet, which will give them access to your BlackBerry e-mails, skype, Facebook, and other internet-based communiations.

The Obama administration plans to submit the bill to lawmakers next year in hopes to better facilitate the arrests of drug dealers and terrorists. The new internet bill could have huge implications on your privacy. It seems the current debacle in the U.A.E and India has specifically paved a way for more countries to access users private data from their BlackBerrys, as they seek the same benefits from Research In Motion.

James X. Dempsey, vice president of the Center for Democracy and Technology, an Internet policy group, said the proposal had “huge implications” and challenged “fundamental elements of the Internet revolution” — including its decentralized design.

“They are really asking for the authority to redesign services that take advantage of the unique, and now pervasive, architecture of the Internet,” he said. “They basically want to turn back the clock and make Internet services function the way that the telephone system used to function.”

However, those within the government agencies see the control in a different light. “We’re talking about lawfully authorized intercepts,” said Valerie E. Caproni, general counsel for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. “We’re not talking expanding authority. We’re talking about preserving our ability to execute our existing authority in order to protect the public safety and national security.”

It is really going to be interesting to see if the new internet bill gets passed. Our guess is that it will, and your once highly secure BlackBerry won't be as secure as you think, at least not to the U.S. Federal government. Not that you have anything to worry about since you shouldn't be doing anything illegal in the first place, right? What say you; government control over your BlackBerry data is: good or bad?

via NY Times