[Cocooningweb]

Hi guys,

My wife’s BB is on a BES, but mine is on a BIS, so I don’t know much about BES administration. My understanding is that server admins can wirelessly back up databases, so I guess they can backup your SMS and emails (no doubt about email). Which means that whatever you send by SMS or email is subject to being reviewed and archived.

I was wondering if they could monitor IM conversations with GoogleTalk, since GT uses data instead of SMS to send/receive messages. In fact my question is does the data go through the BES and can they back it up, or does the data go straight through the carrier (Cingular/TMO)? I’m just curious.

Thanks.

[takeshi]

I can't say for sure but don't assume that anything on a company owned, BES-connected Blackberry is private. This is precisely why I have my own personal Blackberry apart from my work Blackberry.

[ThatGuy]

So, explain the difference in how SMS messages are sent if you have a BB that is not on a BES versus one that is. I guess what I'm trying to figure out is how to know if SMS's are going through the BES or not. For example, if you have a BB that you own and have your own private cell plan, but use a company's BES, how does the SMS decide how to get sent? My assumption was SMS's were sent through the cell network, not the BES.

[armandov99]

From what I understand SMS does not go through the company BES at all (obvious, it's a provider feature). However, BES 4.0+ have the option to backup/log SMS to the BES server from the handheld. So yes, they are not private if that feature is turned on.

I have a personally owned BB on a company BES server. The IT policy is empty, and that feature is not enabled (I have spoken to the BES admin personally) so I'm not sweating it much.

[jibi]

If they are on BES 4.1, they can choose to turn on SMS/Phone auditing, which will basically take your phone call logs or SMS messages and synchronize those user databases with the BES server into a CSV-formatted file. This is enabled by an IT policy. The actual content of any SMS messages is copied into this file, along with the number/contact the conversation is taking place between.

...PIN messages and BlackBerry Messenger messages are similar in design for auditing.

The wireless backup does not include any of these, though. You cannot view the data of the wireless backups, to my knowledge (if you could, it'd be a pain in the butt, as it's stored in the SQL database).

As for GoogleTalk, Yahoo, etc., none can be audited from the BES. I do not believe that any of the IM clients store the messages on the handheld, therefore I don't really see the current audit synchronization logging being applied to those services in the near future.

[jsuen]

The default IT policy enables phone log sync, so an IT Policy will have to be pushed to disable it. Most of this information comes on the phone bill (if they're paying for it), but it shows uncompleted calls as well. SMS and PIN are disabled by default.

[Cocooningweb]

Thank you everyone.