The Blackberry® — An Essential (Government) Service?

The US federal government is concerned about possible damage from a disruption to BlackBerry® service stemming from any injunction that may issue in the ongoing patent dispute between Research In Motion Ltd (RIM) and NTP Inc (NTP). Although NTP has stated that such an injunction would not apply to government or emergency personnel in the United States, the Justice Department noted that proceeding with an injunction could harm these users as there did not appear to be a simple manner in which RIM could identify which BlackBerry users were employed by the federal government. In an attempt to ensure that federal government employees would be allowed to continue to use the devices, the Justice Department has filed a statement of interest in the proceedings. In it, the Justice Department asserts how essential Blackberry service is to the 50,000 to 200,000 federal government employees who are users. The government has recommended that the court delay consideration of the injunction for at least 90 days to give the government time to create a database of federal employees who use the device. For news stories on the US Department of Justice position in the litigation, see: http://makeashorterlink.com/?H2B84233C; and http://makeashorterlink.com/?G1A44553C">http://makeashorterlink.com/?H2B84233C; and http://makeashorterlink.com/?G1A44553C For two other milestones in the RIM/NTP litigation, see earlier issues of e-tips®: Vol 3, No 10, January 26, 2005 and Vol 3, No 26, June 22, 2005. Summary by: Sue Diaz