India says no BlackBerry solution so far

India said Friday no solution has been found to an ongoing standoff over BlackBerry's messaging services, which it has threatened to shut down unless its intelligence agencies can monitor them.

The Indian government and BlackBerry makers Research in Motion (RIM) are seeking to end a three-year deadlock over New Delhi's demand that its security agencies be able to decipher heavily encrypted data carried on the smartphones.

"Voice, SMS and individual email communications can be intercepted and monitored by security agencies in readable format," India's minister of state for communications Sachin Pilot told parliament in a written submission.

"However, security agencies are not able to intercept and monitor the communications" made through BlackBerry's corporate email and messenger chatting services, Pilot said.

In October, India was reported to have granted BlackBerry an extension to a January 31 deadline to provide access to its communications -- the third extension so far.

RIM's representatives have met home and telecommunications ministry officials repeatedly in an effort to allay concerns that unmonitored BlackBerry services could be used by terrorists.

India, battling insurgencies ranging from Kashmir in the northwest to the far-flung northeast, fears militants might use encrypted data to plan attacks.

India has been testing solutions suggested by RIM to access its data.

Banning the service would create disruption for India's corporations, which widely use the BlackBerry. The smartphone has 1.1 million users in India, although these include non-corporate clients.

In October, the UAE withdrew a threatened ban on Blackberry services after saying they had been brought into compliance with the state's regulatory framework.

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