Could Clinton's BlackBerry handle multiple e-mail accounts?

WASHINGTON — One device, one e-mail account.

That was the explanation former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton gave at her Tuesday press conference for conducting all her official and personal business through one e-mail account that she had exclusive control over.

"I opted for convenience to use my personal email account, which was allowed by the State Department, because I thought it would be easier to carry just one device for my work and for my personal emails instead of two," Clinton said.

That may seem odd to smartphone users, accustomed to toggling between two or even three e-mail accounts on the same iPhone or Android device.

What about BlackBerry? After all, Clinton was known as an avid BlackBerry user while at the State Department, even inspiring "Texts from Hillary" Internet memes.

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But it wasn't until 2013, Clinton's last year at State, that Canadian smartphone maker Research in Motion unveiled a feature called BlackBerry Balance meant to separate personal information, including personal e-mail accounts, from work data, which can be managed by corporate security administrators and protected by encryption.

Clinton's one-account solution raises problems, said Nicko van Someren, chief technology officer for Good Technology Corp., which provides companies with secure platforms for their employees' mobile devices.

"The sort of ways you handle personal mail and the way you handle highly sensitive mail is very different," van Someren said. Information from work-related e-mail could be inadvertently cut-and-pasted into a personal e-mail, or accidentally forwarded to someone on a personal contact list.

"Anybody who's ever used auto-complete on an e-mail address knows how that happens. This is why security-conscious enterprises want to keep a complete separation," said van Someren.

Still today, many federal employees juggle two devices — the government-issued BlackBerry, favored for its uniformity and security, and a personal smartphone for games, photos and other apps.

Indeed, Clinton said at a recent conference in Silicon Valley that she now carries two phones. Asked whether she prefers an iPhone or an Android, she said quickly, "iPhone."

"Okay, in full disclosure? And a BlackBerry," she said.

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