We are pleased to announce that Research In Motion (RIM) has sort of leveled up standard BlackBerry users who do not have an IT department behind them by offering them with the power to locate, back up and remotely wipe their handsets for free. This is known as the free BlackBerry Protect service open beta version, where it will come with a wide range of functionality that were previously restricted to enterprise users only. You can more or less tell where RIM is going with this – they certainly see the kind of damage that Apple has inflicted in the consumer market over the control of one’s data on a handset, and will now attempt to position themselves as a serious competitor in the game, although it might be a case of a little too late according to certain quarters. No idea on whether RIM will start charging people for this service though – we hope not, but if Apple does otherwise, RIM will most probably follow suit.
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