Last month the United Arab Emirates mobile operator Etisalat tried to sneak malware onto customers' BlackBerry handsets. But what pushed an operator to try such an underhand trick, and do so in such an inept manner? The snooping software was pushed out as an upgrade, authorised by the operator but almost certainly at the behest of the local government. In reality the package was designed to intercept email communications of selected individuals, but didn't work very well and was rather poorly written. While inept, the attempt serves to highlight the challenge facing law enforcement around the world: manufacturers aren't interested in helping police recover data from criminals, or bodies, data that can be that can be protected by something as complex as the encryption used on the BlackBerry or something as simple as a handset locked with a PIN.
