Blackberries , encryption and other mobile phones

[Mary Hawking]

According to Radio 4 Today this morning, the UAE is banning some 
functions of Blackberries because they are encrypted, the servers are 
outside the UAE and Blackberry has refused to allow access to the 
encrypted messages and calls and regard this as a security threat.
The piece also said that they are not banning iPhones and, by 
implication, other mobiles: does this mean that the traffic on these is 
available to the UAE security forces, at any rate, when used within 
their territory?

I'm about to change from an ancient Nokia and have been considering 
Blackberry, iPhone and Android (not necessarily in that order): what are 
the security models of each, and do they depend on the handset or the 
network?
I.e. if I continue with O2 and get a Blackberry, does the handling of 
the messages depend on the device (Blackberry) or the network supplier 
(O2), and would it be different if I got an iPhone (or one of the 
Android phones) but still stayed with O2?

Confused.

Mary Hawking
non-techie GP
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Mary Hawking