Blackberry awarded Common Criteria Assurance Level 2 validation

BlackBerry Enterprise Server and the BlackBerry device from Research in Motion software have been awarded Common Criteria Evaluation Assurance Level 2 augmented (EAL 2+) validations.

The Common Criteria is a key requirement in government and is also used by large businesses that want to ensure poducts meet a security standard.

The BlackBerry Enterprise product has been approved for use under the Caps security standard in the UK and has also had several FIPS-140 validations for its embedded encryption module.

This means Blackberry devices and the back-end server have been approved for the wireless transmission of sensitive data, up to the Restricted classification, by NATO and the UK government.

Scott Totzke, director of global security Group at Research In Motion, said, "We did not make changes to Blackberry in order to meet the these requriements. Out of the box Blackberrys meet the security specifications."

Earlier this month Research in Motion won a contract with Ministry of Defence and Bedfordshire Police Force.