14 DAY TRIAL // Even though BlackBerry’s market shrunk to the point that we can hardly say that it’s still a major player in the smartphone business, it looks like the company still has some aces up its sleeve.
One of the products BlackBerry is still proud of and prove to be popular among smartphone users as well is BBM (BlackBerry Messenger), the instant messenger service that’s now available on all four mobile platforms: Android, BlackBerry, iOS and Windows Phone.
The number of people who are using BBM has increased exponentially since the application was launched on different operating systems, but now it’s time for BlackBerry to start winning users from its rivals.
And what better way to prove that BBM is the most secure instant messaging service available on mobile phones than to put it against another service of the same caliber?
The first on BlackBerry’s list seems to be Apple’s iMessage, which, apparently, is one the most spammy IMs on the market. It only takes one to make a dummy email account and then get into the iMessage database to send spam to anyone on the list.
However, that’s not possible when you use an instant messenger like BBM, for example. According to BlackBerry, the application was created in such a way that it can protect all its users against spammers.
The reason you can’t have that amount of spam on BBM (or not at all) is the fact that users have a lot more control over who is on their contact list and can send them messages. Including someone on your BBM contact list requires you to send that person an invitation that they can accept.
Basically, it’s impossible to send messages through BBM to a person who doesn’t have you on the contact list, and given the fact that you can’t be on that list unless you have been invited.
Another layer of spam protection that comes integrated within BlackBerry’s application is called BBM Protected. This feature allows users to send messages only to approved contacts and adds an advanced layer of encryption so that messages aren’t vulnerable to spying or hacking during communication.
Last but not least, BBM was created in such a way that each user has a unique PIN, regardless of what device is used. Another advantage would be the fact that with BBM you can communicate with any person no matter what mobile operating system they are using, while the iMessage only targets iOS users.
With more than 85 million users on all mobile platforms, BBM is one of the smaller IMs available on the market, but one with a great potential. What do you think, Apple users, do you feel safer with BBM than while using iMessage?