BlackBerry Limited (BB-T) is expanding its ongoing secure communications partnership with the Government of Canada, including the continued use of its BlackBerry UEM and greater deployment of SecuSUITE to support government-grade encrypted communications.

This multi-year agreement extends BlackBerry's partnership with Shared Services Canada (SSC), first begun in 2021, into 2033 to continue providing secure communications for federal government officials across Canada and abroad. 

According to an SSC media release, "protecting sensitive government communications is an important element of Canada’s digital sovereignty. The SecuSUITE service will be hosted in Government of Canada data centres, supporting Canadian data residency and helping to reduce the risk of unauthorized access.”

Headquartered in Waterloo, Ont., BlackBerry has been working with the federal government for over 40 years.

Purpose-built for high-security environments

Originally known as Research in Motion (RIM) the company was formed in 1984 by Mike Lazaridis and Doug Fregin, focusing on wireless data technology and two-way pagers. Its first device, the RIM 850 was released in 1999 and in 2002 its BlackBerry 5810 device gave users both a phone and email functionality. 

Today, the firm has moved away from phone technologies and focused on providing cybersecurity and secure communications solutions. In 2013, RIM renamed itself BlackBerry Limited.

In its just-released fiscal year 2026 financials, ending Feb. 29, BlackBerry reported total company revenue was $760.59 million (US$549.1 million) , up three per cent year-over-year.

"This agreement reflects the Government of Canada's continued trust in BlackBerry as a long‑term strategic partner for secure communications," said John J. Giamatteo, CEO of BlackBerry in a press release announcing the agreement. "As a Canadian company with decades of experience supporting governments and allies, we are proud to deliver interception‑resistant communications that protect sensitive operations, strengthen sovereign capability, and support Canada's broader objectives to invest in domestic innovation while exporting trusted security technology to partners around the world."

Maaz Yasin, BlackBerry’s global head of government solutions, told TechNX SecuSUITE and its government-grade encryption technology should not be mistaken as being similar to popular communications solutions.

Yasin referred to them as consumer applications in the interview. “They were designed for people to be texting their spouses about the grocery list and their parents in a different country about pictures taken on their vacations. They are not designed for a senior DND deputy minister messaging a colleague or a minister about sensitive, government-related work matters," he said.

High-end encryption

What SecuSUITE brings is end-to-end encryption across voice, text and file protection across all critical government communications. It is designed to ensure only verified users and trusted devices can connect and to prevent unauthorized access to those devices and communications. It supports encrypted calls, messages and attachments across international networks, PBX systems and allied infrastructures. 

It can also provide secure and encrypted communications even during cyberattacks or poor network conditions.

Yasin said this is critical for foreign diplomats and defence officials who are stationed overseas and need to regularly communicate with Canadian officials in critical matters.

“If they are in a foreign country and they don’t really trust the cellular network in that country, the WiFi in that country, this provides that reassurance,” he continued. SecuSUITE also allows encrypted calls to ‘break out’ to a secure PBX connection back to Canada.

By further protecting metadata, including timing, frequency and participant relationships in the communications, it removes another means for bad actors to access sensitive data and communications. 

That level of security in SecuSUITE is greater than what any consumer-facing messaging apps can offer, he said. He drove the point home more bluntly by adding that “all those messages sitting on the device in WhatsApp and Signal, they’re completely unprotected.”

Integration with BlackBerry UEM

Yasin said SecuSUITE works in tandem with BlackBerry’s UEM (Unified Endpoint Management) solution that is currently used by government agencies in Canada.

BlackBerry UEM is a secure, multiplatform software solution that lets governments manage, secure and closely monitor mobile devices, while enforcing compliance policies.

Yasin described BlackBerry UEM as “the fort, the locker, the hard shell that protects data on your phone.” 

It adds a second layer of security and data protection, and allows government officials to set policies for how data can be accessed and used.

“An administrator from a government IT department can add an extra policy requirement on that device to ensure the protection of data above and beyond whatever standard settings your device may have,” Yasin said. “A good example of that would be preventing people from copying or pasting a work email into a less-secure non-work application... or a screenshot of an email and put it into your family’s WhatsApp group chat.

"Think of it as mobile device management in addition to a security solution.”