A BlackBerry user displays a text message sent notifying him of the suspension of services in the UAE. Picture: AP Source: AP
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BLACKBERRY users across Europe, the Middle East and Africa were hit with service disruptions to their smartphones for a second day after an unexplained glitch cut off internet and messaging services for large numbers of users around the world.
Research in Motion Ltd, which makes BlackBerry devices, acknowledged there were ongoing issues today, hours after it said services were operating normally and the issue responsible for delays in subscriber services a day earlier had been resolved.
"Some areas have messaging delays and impaired browsing," Blackberry said on Twitter, adding it was working to "restore normal service as quickly as possible."
In Britain, Vodafone UK told customers via Twitter that service was not fully restored. Rival T-Mobile UK blamed "a European-wide outage on the BlackBerry network" which it said was affecting all mobile operators. There were also reports of problems elsewhere in Europe, such as Spain.
The disruptions were also felt in the Middle East and Africa.
The company also revealed that the areas affected now include South America, with users in Brazil, Chile and Argentina suffering loss of service.
Etisalat, which operates in the United Arab Emirates, apologised for "the further interruption" to Blackberry services, "once again due to RIM problems".
And Kenya's Safaricom Ltd said on Twitter that its Blackberry customers were experiencing a "technical fault," while South Africa's Vodacom told subscribers the issues were affecting multiple networks and countries.
There were no reports of any problems in the US.
Angry smartphone users also used Twitter to vent frustration with the company and bemoaned the loss of their messaging capabilities, questioning why the company took so long to restore services.
And the latest crash appeared to be the last straw for many users.
Rob Flello, the Labour MP for Stoke-on-Trent South, said: "Blackberry stopped working again - looks like I will be trading it in for an iPhone!!"
The Guardian�reported the problems have been caused by database corruption in Slough.
In the US, RIM has lost 4.3 million users in the past year, according to calculations by Horace Dediu, of the independent consultancy Asymco. "[It] is now at about the same number of users it had in late 2009. This is in a market that has more than doubled," he told The Guardian.
"With only about 16.5 million US users and an average loss of half a million users per month, unless something drastic happens, RIM could lose its entire US user base by the end of next year."
- with Agence-France Press and news.com.au
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