Operators to follow ministry’s instruction on RIM

Two giant telecommunication operators, Telkomsel and Excelcomindo, said they will follow the instruction of Communication and Information Minister Tifatul Sembiring to stop providing their services to Research In Motion (RIM) until the blackberry producer blocks porn content.

“It is ok, but if the telecommunication consumers get upset, do not blame the operators,”  Excelcomindo Axiata president director Hasnul Suhaimi said over the weekend, as quoted by Tempointeraktif.com.

The government must inform the public about the porn content issue before closing the RIM network, Hasnul said

Excelcomindo has 650,000 BlackBerry users.

Telkomsel president director Sarwoto Atmosutarno admitted that closing the RIM network will affect its consumers, but the impact would not be significant.

Telkomsel has 960,000 BlackBerry subscribers.

Minister Tifatul Sembiring set a two-week deadline on Friday for the RIM Indonesia representative to block pornographic websites, otherwise its server would be shut down by the government.

Indonesia has some 1.5 million BlackBerry users, or around 7.1 percent of 21 million smartphones users nationwide.