RIM seals BlackBerry deal in Saudi Arabia

Sets up local server

Canada's Research In Motion has reached a preliminary agreement with Saudi Arabia's telecom watchdog and mobile phone operators to set up a server in the country to handle Blackberry data, according to reports.

"A preliminary agreement has already been reached and a formal deal between the parties is in the final stages of negotiations," an official at a Saudi-based telecom operator apparently involved in the talks told the Wall Street Journal.

The Middle Eastern kingdom has some 700,000 BlackBerry users, but some of the services they use can't be monitored by Saudi authorities as the data is set offshore. This had them miffed and threatening to ban the device.

The United Arab Emirates and several countries in the Middle East as well as India have similar concerns.

Now it looks like RIM will bow to the pressure and set up a snoop-friendly device somewhere in Saudi.

Either that or they'ce agreed to clad all their BlackBerrys in a burkha.

After all, you can't have people talking about stuff you  don't know about, it might be dangerous. They could be dissing your mum.