No threat from Blackberry: Govt

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The government on Wednesday said there was no threat, whatsoever, from Blackberry services, even as security agencies insist on intercepting data sent through the service as they fear it could be used by terrorists.

"There is no threat from Blackberry services," Telecom Secretary Siddharth Behura said in New Delhi.

Asked if the government would give approval to companies that have applied for starting Blackberry services, he said: "There is no permission needed for starting value added services. We have not given permission to anybody, we have not disallowed anybody."

His statement assumes significance in the backdrop of the country's security agencies expressing fear that terrorists may be using the service to plan their operations and that a mechanism should be put in place to monitor content sent through Blackberry - a premium data and voice service.

Canada-based Research-in-Motion, the licensor of Blackberry technology, has expressed its inability to either provide a master-key to Indian security agencies to decode content or shift servers to the sub-continent nation to enable them monitor e-mails and other data.