Last week, a publication by Vice revealed that the Canadian police could use the Master Key of BlackBerry Messenger something that allowed her to read over 1 million messages sent by BlackBerry devices between 2010 and 2012.
The way the Canadian Police acquired the key was not known, but it helped to pinpoint an 2011 murder case in Montreal.
Today, BlackBerry CEO John Chen confirmed that the company had worked with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), but did not specify whether they had given them the encryption key.
"We have been making our position clear for a long time: technology companies as good corporate citizens should comply with reasonable requests for legal access," Chen said in a post on the company's blog.
He added: “That belief was put to the test in an old case and backfired recently in the news, speculating and questioning BlackBerry's corporate and ethical principles. In the end, the case led to the dismantling of a major criminal organization.”
BlackBerry's attitude to share privacy of its users with governments stands in stark contrast to Apple's position on the issue. Recently, its maker iPhone αρνήθηκε να βοηθήσει το Υπουργείο Δικαιοσύνης των ΗΠΑ στο “σπάσιμο” της συσκευής που χρησιμοποιήθηκε από ένα τρομοκράτη στο San Bernardino.
Of course BlackBerry is by no means the first company to help law enforcement in this way, but it's really disturbing to hear Mr. Chen justify his personal surveillance tactics. data without informing the public.
It is also worth noting that BlackBerry stopped its work in Pakistan last November when the government requested access to its servers. It's not exactly the same as the Montreal murder case, but the fact that the same company was forced to react so differently to these two scenarios should give us a sense of how complicated the debate about encryption is.
