Dubai police adopt BlackBerry Messenger to talk to the public

Dubai authorities have a love-hate relationship with BlackBerry. From stoking the Dubai rumour mill to a prank BBM message which tied up the Dubai emergency number, 999, routing 14,000 calls in the space of five hours, a 120 per cent increase in volume.

This time around, the Dubai Police are using the BlackBerry Messenger Service to their advantage. In an announcement, made on Twitter no less, they shared the Dubai Police’s very own pin number, which would be sharing what they called Awareness Campaigns.

It’s not entirely clear how interactive the service is going to be, or if it will simply be a means to deliver announcements to the public. With BlackBerry popularity far from waning in the Middle East, it’s certainly a smart choice on the part of the police to use a medium which will literally have them in Dubai residents’ pockets.

Police departments around the world are quickly taking note of the technology available to them with the Vancouver Police using QR codes to capture criminals and an Arkansas police department getting people to text in crime tips. The Dubai Police Department is the first in the region to make use of modern technology, and the first worldwide to use BlackBerry Messenger on the job.