BlackBerry says:

The touch-enabled keyboard allows you to brush your fingers over the QWERTY keyboard and scroll through information on screen. This is perfect when managing the list of messages in the BlackBerry Hub, or when browsing a website (pro tip: turn your Passport sideways for smoother swiping when you're in hard-core content consumption mode). You get a full wide view of content and can scroll through without obstructing the screen.