5 BlackBerry Safety Tips to Protect your Personal Information

10.23.09 Alex M

Alexbest

Hello world! My name is Alex M. and I’m a Security Product Manager at Research In Motion (RIM). My job is to make sure that folks like you and me are safe when we use a BlackBerry® smartphone. What do I mean by “safe”? Security is about letting the good guys in and keeping the bad guys out. Sounds simple, right? Just don’t tell that to my boss. :D

BlackBerry smartphones come with a huge set of built-in security features, but how do we use them and what do they really do? Those are the questions I’ll be trying to answer with every post. Let’s start from the beginning: protecting your personal information.

Many of us (and I’m no exception) keep important information on our BlackBerry smartphones. The last thing we all want is this information getting into the wrong hands if our BlackBerry smartphone is lost or we replace it with a newer model. The good news is that BlackBerry smartphones are very tough nuts to crack, especially if you take the right steps to protect your information.

Wipe It!

Replacing your BlackBerry smartphone is like selling a used car – you need to make sure you clear it out first! Here are three easy ways to do that:

  1. Wipe your BlackBerry smartphone data.
  2. If you have a BlackBerry® Internet Service account, contact your carrier and ask them to remove it. If you don’t, your emails will keep being sent to your old smartphone even after you wipe it.
  3. If you have a corporate BlackBerry smartphone, ask your IT admins to remove the IT policies. The new owner will thank you!

Protect It!

Of course, smartphones are also easy to lose, and many are stolen each day. To protect your personal information in case your BlackBerry smartphone is lost or stolen:

  1. Make sure you set a password. By default, an attacker only has 10 tries to get it right, so making it hard to guess is very important. Here some useful tips on choosing a strong password.
  2. Use content protection to encrypt all of your personal data. You can enable this by selecting Options -> Security Options -> General Settings on most BlackBerry smartphones.

If you do lose your smartphone, you will also want to contact your carrier right away to disable your SIM card (or equivalent). If you have a corporate smartphone, make sure you contact your IT staff first. They will usually be able to remotely enable security features and/or wipe your smartphone.

So there you have it, a few simple and practical ideas. Any tips you want to share? Anything you want to hear about next time? Let me know in the comments. Till next time, stay alert, stay safe.

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Posted in Security | Tagged , , ,
  • epn1
    I'd like to make a security-related feature suggestion. As Alex points out, the first step to securing your device is to enable password protection. And as noted in the "choosing a strong password" link, to be secure a password should have a variety off characters and should be long. (The article at the link suggests a whopping 12-14 characters!!)

    In theory, that's all good. But in reality, having a 14 character password that includes uppercase, lower case, numbers and maybe symbols is going to involve 20+ clicks on a tiny keyboard. Having to do that every time you pick up the device is so burdensome that some will have short insecure passwords (or no passwords) and others (like me) will find ourselves just not using the BlackBerry as often as we'd like.

    To fix that, I suggest this: Allow the user to set two passwords -- a quick password and a standards password. The quick password would only work if entered correctly on the first try and within a few seconds of when the first character is entered. Any error or delay and the unit can only be opened with the strong standards password.

    Because the quick password must be entered exactly right without error in a few seconds, the chances of anyone guessing it correctly are miniscule. As a result, even a short (3-4 character) password would be a secure way to lock the unit. The long password would be the fallback in case the owner goofed when entering the short one.

    This was a feature in a locking app (TealLock) I had for a Palm device, and it was great!
  • Thanks for the suggestion. Keep in mind that guidelines for strong passwords assume an unlimited number of attempts, whereas BlackBerry smartphones only allow 10 attempts. Many "weak" passwords are actually quite strong on BlackBerry smartphones.
  • Joey
    I am the administrator for a seven device BPS installation at a small community bank. I currently have third-party app downloads restricted. My users are complaining because they would like to utilize some of the third-party apps that are available. I am concerned about the risks associated with enabling this and curious about how well the BAW apps are tested and if there is a way to restrict them to only the BAW apps. Can you give me any guidance or point me to some resources that detail how this works?
  • OP
    If you enable content protection, most 3rd party application that sync data will have problems. That includes Google Sync, the Rexwireless applications, syncml clients, etc.

    Isn't a password enough since the device will be wiped after 10 failed attempts?
    What are the risks of leaving the device's memory unencrypted?
  • Lexy
    How do I retrieve blackberry instant messages that I deleted from my phone?
  • Lexy,

    If you have a backup of your BlackBerry that you created with BlackBerry Desktop Manager you could retrieve them there. If you do not have a backup of the BlackBerry then there will be no way to retrieve them.
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