At a press conference on Tuesday, Clinton claimed that she had one phone with one email account, which only she could access. “I opted for convenience to use my personal email account, which was allowed by the State Department, because I thought it would be easier to carry just one device for my work and for my personal emails instead of two,” Clinton said.
BlackBerry update fixed problem… in 2013
Now some of you that are used to navigating between multiple email accounts on your iPhone or Android device may be confused by this statement, but the situation with BlackBerry is different. As you may or may not be aware, Clinton was a huge fan of BlackBerry phones during her time at the State Department, so much so that a series of memes called “Texts from Hillary” appeared online.
However it is important to remember that Research in Motion, the Canadian manufacturer of BlackBerry phones, only released a feature known as BlackBerry Balance in order to separate personal data from work-related data in 2013. Prior to its release, in Clinton’s last year as Secretary of State, it was impossible to manage two email accounts on the same BlackBerry device.
Security concerns
Security experts have criticized Clinton’s use of a single account, claiming that it raises security problems. Nicko van Someren, chief technology officer for Good Technology Corp., claims that “the sort of ways you handle personal mail and the way you handle highly sensitive mail is very different.”
Sensitive information could be accidentally copied into a personal email, or inadvertently forwarded to someone on a personal contact list.
“Anybody who’s ever used auto-complete on an e-mail address knows how that happens. This is why security-conscious enterprises want to keep a complete separation,” van Someren continued.
It is common for federal employees to use two devices. The first is a BlackBerry issued by the government for its uniformity and security, and the second is a personal smartphone for other applications.
It seems that Clinton herself has learned her lesson. At a conference in Silicon Valley she recently admitted that she now carries two phones, an iPhone and a BlackBerry.
