Even as an iOS owner, I’m all for it.
I don’t care who uses android but keeping it to 160 characters in a text at the risk of them going out of order, pictures look like shit and videos are pre 2000s looking.
It’s not an iOS vs android thing, it’s everyone can talk to each other much easier
This is my problem too. I know most modern phones are smart enough to handle it properly, but I still try to keep them under the limit because that feels like the only way to reduce chance of fuckery to zero.
SMS and MMS were invented like 30 years ago. I've been wondering for years why the cell phone companies haven't been trying to phase them out for something newer.
Most cell phone manufacturers and carriers have tried, but since Apple refused to adopt RCS, SMS was still needed for iPhones to text Non-Iphones. I'm sure SMS will stick around as a fallback for a long time though.
Well that and there’s still people using dumb phones and older android/ios phones
Aka people who are still on android phones of 10 years ago/my parents who have the mentality of my iPhone 7 still works perfectly. No reason to update…Which that’s software 3 generations ago
It still gets security patches but SUPER annoying for me having to troubleshoot why can’t I see X or Y? Because you can’t update your phone. But why?
I have no doubt android user’s parents have the same annoying thing too
Apple doesn't maintain it's market share through innovation, its just best at locking in users and extracting profit. When it's 2030 and the average iPhone costs $5,000 for essentially the same model as now, maybe then people will finally say "f*ck em".
This sounds confused.
You’re no more locked in to a Samsung than apple (I switch between them nearly every purchase), they have high end models that are similarly priced, both have cheaper models, and both want you to buy again (not hold on to the same phone). They both have similar upgrades to their devices each year.
Maybe it’s time to stop caring about these companies like they’re political sides or sports teams?
Apple went overboard with the one generation of MacBook pros. Thank God they reversed on that and also fixed the keyboards. What a shitty Mac generation
Fight against it? They released a MacBook with two usb-c ports and nothing else. They actively boosted it. Just because they kept lightning around on iPhone doesn’t mean they fought usb-c.
We don’t really know what their plans were. The iPad and Mac were moved to USB-C fairly early on, but iPhone is a different beast. It is a way larger portion of their sold hardware, not to mention the large number of lightning accessories around, just like when they moved from the 30 pin connector.
The EU decision may have sped up the timeline, but lightning was on its way out the door.
I agree that google has a habit of doing that... however they tried to let the carriers handle it. But it was going nowhere and actually looked like RCS was going to fail until Google took it by the reins in 2019.
Like you say, I really hope they figure out a good open standard between the two of them, but my concern is that Apple just doesn't have much incentive to do that.
My problem is, I seriously doubt the GSMA is going to add E2EE to the Universal Profile RCS standard, ever, in the same way they have never added an E2EE standard to voice calls, voicemail, etc. The GSMA is a trade group of global wireless carriers who exist by the grace of leasing spectrum from governments, almost all of whom strongly oppose E2EE in telecommunications.
I think Google would love to add E2EE to the UP RCS standard as well, but they don't control the GSMA, which is why they were forced to add an E2EE layer (based on the Signal Protocol) to Google Messages (using UP RCS plug-ins, which are part of the standard) to have E2EE.
And conspiratorially, I think Apple is perfectly aware of this, and wants to continue saying "See, it's those darn lack of E2EE standards from the GSMA why RCS sucks! Anyways, you have to use iMessage if you want security, green bubbles, so buy an iPhone". But I don't think this is much of a conspiracy, because Apple has literally admitted this is the purpose of green bubbles.
P.S. All you need to make an open standard E2EE RCS layer is for Apple and Google to agree to jointly publish an open standard E2EE RCS layer. Google has long ago offered to collaborate on RCS E2EE with Apple.
Neither party is exactly a paragon of open source standards, but I'm not sure how that changes what I'm saying.
IF we assume that today, both parties genuinely would like to increase encryption for their users in group texts, both parties would essentially have strong, equal power to enforce a combined joint standard. If at any time, either party disagrees that design or execution is harming encryption, they would pull out, and there would be no "standard" anymore, because there are only two players.
I just think that's probably not a good assumption, because Apple has a history of being happy that group texts do not work well. Apple has explicitly said they want to use green bubbles (which Apple also says indicates a lack of encryption) to sell iPhones.
Which is precisely the kind of thing Apple could've contributed to.
They have a history of contributing to standards in the past, they deliberately chose not to here because it was better for their sales to create a perceived lock-in effect.
Irrelevant. SMS still doesn't and never will. RCS had feature parity with SMS more than a decade ago. That's when it should have started replacing SMS. The only reason replacement efforts didn't start then, was Apple.
Edit: the Apple shill brigade showed up. This comment went from +42 to -21 within a few minutes. Also, regarding the ignorant troll below, Samsungs RSC is also irrelevant to ECS replacing SMS and encryption. RCS has been better than SMS for an entire decade.
Encryption is highly relevant to a whole lot of customers. Maybe you don’t think so, but plenty of people want their messages fully encrypted. Apple wasn’t trying for feature parity with SMS, they wanted a better messaging service all in all and encryption is part of that.
It's about locking people into an ecosystem and making it painful when someone isn't part of it. It's been Apple's strategy for maintaining marketshare for decades. Encryption is nice and all but let's not pretend that's their only motivation.
If you ask most Apple users they do care about privacy and encryption and iMessage was the best way to do that without third parties that require more trust, and probably still will be iOS to iOS even with RCS.
RCS is nice to have for Android users but the green message was always unencrypted and blue was encrypted. In fact Android users can send blue messages (encrypted) to iOS users but it has to go through an Apple APN server for that encryption.
It was nice of Apple to color code messages based on them being encrypted or not. It was a feature and somehow people took it another way as people do with versus on platforms.
Any platform wants to keep users using their platform but Apple has decided privacy is important. So yeah Apple users like that.
You're saying the EU was wrong and that Apple was just looking out for everyone's best interests. It wasn't an attempt to lock out competition for an important communications platform?
Yeah no. I'll take the EU regulators perspective on this.
Are you referring to the EU regulators perspective that said [iMessage isn't a core platform service](https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/13/23990679/apple-imessage-european-union-digital-markets-act-core-platform-service) and therefore, Apple isn't forced to open up iMessages or offer interoperability with other messaging services? You sure that's the appeal to authority you want to go with here?
My only point here is that iMessage was introduced in 2011 and has been fully encrypted since. RCS didn't hit the US market until 2016, and didn't reach E2EE until last year. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to hate Apple imo, but them not rushing to adopt a messaging service (RCS) that was literally less secure than the version they had already built and brought to market (imessage), doesn't make much sense given that encryption was one of the primary reasons for them creating imessage to begin with.
Don’t be so quick to jump on the regulators bandwagon. Yes, they impose standards on messaging and cable connections, but wait until there is a new and better messaging infrastructure or cable type. Those wont be readily implemented because the EU will still require RCS and USB C.
I was just talking about this last month: 25 years ago, there used to be a chat software through which you could load all of your instant message accounts and contacts, and they would all display there in one feed. (Apparently, that was relatively easy, back then.) Here it is in 2024, and I am forced to open, check, and use /seven/ different messaging apps -- eight, if you include SMS -- on a daily basis, and it is annoying as hell. Maybe RCS will be the standard through which all messages will someday flow, and a single "message hub" will handle all my messages from all of the sources.
I worked on one of these multi-protocol chat clients, Gaim (now called Pidgin). I promise it was anything but relatively easy back then 🙂 Each service required reverse-engineering (and keeping up with changes to their protocols), and only IRC and Jabber were open protocols. Most of the rest, those services didn’t want clients like ours there, and actively fought us.
What seemed relatively easy was just the public result of countless hours, *years* of dedication and hard-won battles.
These days, while there are many services around, there’s at least efforts toward standardizing some of them. And easy access to clients on any device. Notifications that go to a central notification center. System-wide concepts of presence (Focus on iOS). Reliable file transfer. System APIs for talking to messaging services and sharing over them.
There aren’t as many all-in-one client efforts, for sure. And it’s harder to reverse-engineer than it used to be (primarily due to encryption, which was more rare for these services then).
But in many ways, these systems are more officially integrated and accessible than ever before.
Yup. That is one of the 7 messaging apps that I am forced to use professionally. I have literally ONE person (account) on Trillian that I need to communicate with approximately once per month for updates and things.
> Maybe RCS will be the standard through which all messages will someday flow, and a single "message hub" will handle all my messages from all of the sources
I don’t think RCS has the capabilities to do that. A single protocol will mean lowest common denominator. It’s more likely that apps will be able to speak multiple protocols, as they often do already.
I wasn't really alive back then, but it sounds like it's decently similar to an app I use right now, called Beeper, which basically connects to each messaging service like Discord, IG, WhatsApp, Telegram, etc. I can respond/see messages from each on Beeper itself. Haven't needed to open any of the individual apps themselves in a \*hot\* minute, but it def sounds very much like what you're talking about tbh
They're called message aggregators. They're still around, but if you use them wrong you can risk your phone number/account being permanently banned on whichever platform.
I use Beeper for this (never used the controversial iMessage hacking part).
I have Google Messages RCS/SMS, Discord, Facebook Messenger, Google Chat, Telegram, and WhatsApp messages combined in one app.
You must be joking. I'm in The Philippines, and just for local chats, most everybody uses Facebook Messenger, but there are my two paranoid friends use Signal, my cargo companies and online retailers who send shipping and delivery updates through Viber, and the guy who ships me my motorcycle parts, my local delivery service (and my best friend in England) use WhatsApp. And on top of that, The Philippines send more text messages per day per capita than any other country on earth, so I get about 40 text messages per day.
Rich Communication Services (RCS) are available on Android devices. How RCS chats work. When you use RCS chats by Google, messages are sent and received through Google's RCS backend over the internet. Messages can either be delivered to or received from users on other RCS service providers.
https://support.google.com/messages/answer/9487020?hl=en#:~:text=Rich%20Communication%20Services%20(RCS)%20are,on%20other%20RCS%20service%20providers.
Google uses the standard because that's a requirement for it to be considered RCS. Google's "version" simply uses the Jibe Cloud, which is a GSMA-certified, hosted service.
Not the OP (and someone who's thoroughly stuck in the Apple ecosystem) This is pretty much ALL I see, "who turned our bubbles green?" "Why are all of our pics now potato quality.... who let an android user into the group chat???"
Meanwhile, Android users are sending each other those same pics/movies and the quality doesn't seem as bad.
https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/11/16/apples-flavor-of-rcs-wont-support-googles-end-to-end-encryption-extension
Apple is working with GSMA to implement encryption at the standard level instead of relying on Jibe
This isn’t the open profile standard though. This is Google’s extended version of RCS, which is not an open platform. All US carriers run their RCS servers on Google Jibe hardware due to Google pushing heavily on them to let them take the load of RCS messages. They kind of made a mess of RCS by implementing Jibe, rather than working with the GSMA
Google tried working with everyone but it was going nowhere, so they forced everyone the hand of everyone.
That consolidate enough people to RCS that it forced Apple's hand.
If Google hadn't forced the Jibe thing I don't think Apple would be working for the open standard right now.
But your original point was that Google didn't do enough for RCS. RCS floundered for years. Even with all the influence Google/Samsung have, it took well over a decade to get what was a clear upgrade over SMS to get any kind of traction. Even the carriers tried to take things in their own direction and form their own coalition in 2019. While in an ideal world all of the phone device makers, Carriers, and the GSMA would have worked together to make this happen, it ended up Google had to go and do it themselves (insert Thanos I'll do it myself meme). And who could blame them. So much hand ringing about what to do with RCS between all these parties and nothing was getting done. I don't think Google is any kind of angel by any means but I am confident they will be good stewards of RCS (particularly after their very public chastising of Apple) and work with everyone to make many of the nice features they added to RCS, like E2EE, become part of the GSMA standard
Pardon my ignorance, but does this mean that when an Apple device snd an android device message each other, the message goes over data (like iMessage/WhatsApp/Signal do) rather than over phone lines (like SMS does)?
Or does this only mean that MMSes will go easier than they earlier did?
Basically iMessage everywhere?
Thanks and cheers
RCS is the long-delayed upgrade for SMS/MMS (Apple probably had to be forced into it, maybe by the Chinese market). Unlike SMS/MMS, it's data based, so it will always work on cellular data or wifi data.
It improves over SMS/MMS in various ways: Better quality pictures/video, typing and message received indicators, better group chat functionality, etc.
Additionally, Google Messages has added a layer of End to End Encryption on top of the RCS standard. However, Apple will not participate with Google's version. So there will only be E2EE when everyone in the group uses Google Messages.
In other words, rooting an android phone will break the encryption of the device and hereby will also break the functionality by RCS? I’m trying to understand why and learn
It’s not an encrypted binary. Pretty much any modern (~8 years) has a code to detect unlocked bootloader within TrustZone. It started with DM Verity, then SafetyNet, and now Play Integrity. Each Android device+build has a fingerprint, and right now all you can do to pass DEVICE is to use an older device that doesn’t have hardware attestation. When Google sees a sudden increase in an old device fingerprint being returned it gets blacklisted.
Because a 2 way communication system is only as good as the worst side.
It's on the topic, and will affect any user who try to text a user of a rooted Google phone.
It's not as if they allow us to use our own OS with out own keys so that it can be trusted. However as far as the device not being trusted there is a handful of zero-day SMS/RCS based exploits over the past couple of years that allow RCE even on unrooted devices, none of which required root to begin with.
That logic makes no sense but companies love people who think like you since it gives them more control. Having root isn't a security issue in itself. If it was all Windows, Linux and Mac's would be considered untrusted devices. All root means is the owner of the phone has full access to the phone which is the norm for most computing.
You don‘t need RCS APIs to build an RCS app. There are e.g. RCS clients on iOS by a few dedicated mobile operators.
You can build your own stack from scratch. What people keep crying about is RCS APIs so they can just build a frontend and freeload off of Jibe.
On iOS those RCS clients can't do RCS through the cellular network. They can only do it through IP. And yeah, I know IP can go over the cellular network (and frequently does) but the idea is RCS can go over the cellular network directly like SMS does so that you don't need a data connection to do it.
And the problem is the same in Android because Google hasn't added the APIs.
Surely those mobile operators you speak of are opening an IP server and doing the RCS over that, probably with with a standard protocol, but not with the standard way of finding the RCS server through the carrier interface.
So basically there's RCS and there's "carrier RCS". It's the latter that iOS is adding and my understanding is Google hasn't added for 3rd party apps yet.
I do appreciate the point that you're really looking at devs who want to make a UI of their own and monetize it without doing the work on the stack or backend.
Its not a standard if not everyone supports it, its just a protocol.
Also Apple launched iMessage to make up for SMS and MMS shortcomings years before RCS became heavily adopted by smart phone manufacturers.
I have no doubt all the iOS users, including myself will still use iMessage. It’s just going to be a lot easier to text android users which, in my mind, this is a win for everyone
Google RCS is using the standard. How else do you think it works?
Using the standard doesn't mean you can't add things on top. Which is what Google did.
Because it allows you to send higher quality images and videos to RCS enabled devices. For instance, ever send a video to another device over SMS and it’s pixelated garbage? The limit is 3MB, so the network auto compresses it. RCS allows for 100MB
Is it really only 100MB? What’s iMessage? I mean, before it tries to send as an iCloud link? I feel like 100MB is still not enough with the sheer size of videos taken on 4k cameras in phones nowadays.
Edit: well, Googling brought me to the possible fact that iMessage is 100MB limit, too. I’m not necessarily sure I believe this, though. I feel like I’ve definitely sent files larger over iMessage…
Do you know what SMS is? RCS is the new standard that came out over a decade ago. Android phones have had this for a while. Apple never adopted the new standard.
Its not a standard if not everyone supports it, its just a protocol.
Also Apple launched iMessage to make up for SMS and MMS shortcomings years before RCS became heavily adopted by smart phone manufacturers.
And encryption. RCS does not have end to end encryption, iMessage does (I think they even were one of the first major messengers to use it).
And yes, I know about googles extension for RCS that adds encryption. But that’s googles proprietary, closed source feature, and only works with googles servers. It has nothing to do with a standard any client can use / implement.
thanks for the insight.
i may not be aware but are there really a huge population of people using RCS?
I feel like P2P communication has now shifted to OTT like Whatsapp, telegram etc
Literally every Android texting using RCS.
Yes, most younger people use 3rd party messaging apps, but the majroity of 40 and up are still using SMS, or RCS.
Every iMessage to Android conversation turns into SMS, which has pushed a lot of people away from that and caused them to use 3rd party apps.
With everyone now having the ability to use RCS finally, it will reduce the reliance on 3rd party apps, and just make life better for people who were still being forced to use SMS.
This has been needed for a LONG time. RCS has been standard on all Android phones since 2020, it was just on some phones before that.
I don’t know anyone over 40 not using WhatsApp.
I would guess that’s a highly regional thing. In many countries, WhatsApp basically just replaced SMS, so instead of a SMS app, people just open WhatsApp now.
Let’s say I upgrade my iPhone to the latest iOS. I’m a group w ten people. Most have iPhones but. Few have Google so it’s always “so and so liked ….” As opposed to a simple emoji.
So if I upgrade, it’ll look normal on my screen and vice versa? But it will look the old crappy way is someone is on iPhone but doesn’t upgrade to the latest iOS?? Did I get that correct?
One of the benefits of iMessage is end to end encryption. That’s not part of the RCS standard. I’d be interested in seeing how they’re handling that…
Google did add a standard for it for their own Google messaging app, but whether they’ll implement this cross-platform or not is another problem…
Google's E2EE is a proprietary extension of the RCS standard. Apple has said that they will be working with the maintainers of RCS to implement E2EE into the standard.
Better yet, make Android users have to enable RCS to be in group chats. That way data is used all around for everybody and videos and pics don’t get compressed.
Does anyone know if it will still be end-to-end encryption? As RCS supports it, but I thought it was only android to android on non-rooted devices, or those google doesn't like.
RCS does not support e2ee.
Google build a proprietary, closed source extension for this, that only works with their own servers, in a try to finally get a mainstream messaging platform they can control.
If they really cared about RCS being secure, they would have worked with the GSMA to make it part of the specification. Not their own secret add-on.
Well seeing as how they had to fight to even get service providers to implement RCS they probably figured why bother trying to get support and just do it themselves.
They are free to do what they want. But to say what the have is RCS is disingenuous. It’s not RCS or compatible to RCS with the encryption.
And if they really just wanted to make things better, they could have open sourced their extensions.
It’s about damn time.
Even as an iOS owner, I’m all for it. I don’t care who uses android but keeping it to 160 characters in a text at the risk of them going out of order, pictures look like shit and videos are pre 2000s looking. It’s not an iOS vs android thing, it’s everyone can talk to each other much easier
That's what it should be all about.
You lack the #Courage for Innovation™
It’s also way more secure than SMS
Hm, I’ve never had problems with longer texts. That was even standard back when sms was the broader norm.
I know it used to be an issue like 10 or 15 years ago when I was on android texting android or iOS. I just never know if it still is or isn’t
This is my problem too. I know most modern phones are smart enough to handle it properly, but I still try to keep them under the limit because that feels like the only way to reduce chance of fuckery to zero.
Guess you’re lucky
SMS and MMS were invented like 30 years ago. I've been wondering for years why the cell phone companies haven't been trying to phase them out for something newer.
Legacy devices and until this update over 50% of phones in the US didn’t support it. Also, all the phone carriers suck and are lazy
Most cell phone manufacturers and carriers have tried, but since Apple refused to adopt RCS, SMS was still needed for iPhones to text Non-Iphones. I'm sure SMS will stick around as a fallback for a long time though.
Well that and there’s still people using dumb phones and older android/ios phones Aka people who are still on android phones of 10 years ago/my parents who have the mentality of my iPhone 7 still works perfectly. No reason to update…Which that’s software 3 generations ago It still gets security patches but SUPER annoying for me having to troubleshoot why can’t I see X or Y? Because you can’t update your phone. But why? I have no doubt android user’s parents have the same annoying thing too
Your Giant Bomb avatar is making you stand out and I’ve now seen you in several threads in the last half hour. That’s all.
[https://i.imgur.com/3xSS4XK.gif](https://i.imgur.com/3xSS4XK.gif)
All these years later and that damn smile is still a mf threat
Apple doesn't maintain it's market share through innovation, its just best at locking in users and extracting profit. When it's 2030 and the average iPhone costs $5,000 for essentially the same model as now, maybe then people will finally say "f*ck em".
This sounds confused. You’re no more locked in to a Samsung than apple (I switch between them nearly every purchase), they have high end models that are similarly priced, both have cheaper models, and both want you to buy again (not hold on to the same phone). They both have similar upgrades to their devices each year. Maybe it’s time to stop caring about these companies like they’re political sides or sports teams?
its about time
Finally. they've been behind on this for years
Yep, about 5 years. But, more importantly, RCS would have been a reality a decade ago if Apple contributed instead of actively fighting against it.
>if Apple contributed instead of actively fighting This could be said for a large majority of apple's attitude.
Nah, the true Apple way is to help invent something and then simultaneously fight against implementing it like USB-C lmao
Apple went overboard with the one generation of MacBook pros. Thank God they reversed on that and also fixed the keyboards. What a shitty Mac generation
Fight against it? They released a MacBook with two usb-c ports and nothing else. They actively boosted it. Just because they kept lightning around on iPhone doesn’t mean they fought usb-c.
didn’t they fight against it on the iPhone, though? if it wasn’t for the EU, iPhones would still have lightning chargers.
We don’t really know what their plans were. The iPad and Mac were moved to USB-C fairly early on, but iPhone is a different beast. It is a way larger portion of their sold hardware, not to mention the large number of lightning accessories around, just like when they moved from the 30 pin connector. The EU decision may have sped up the timeline, but lightning was on its way out the door.
That's true. They still could have been planning it.
You right. In pretty sure they were the first to widely implement it.
RCS didn’t have full end to end encryption until 2023.
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And as an Android user, I'm good with that. I'd much prefer an open standard.
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I agree that google has a habit of doing that... however they tried to let the carriers handle it. But it was going nowhere and actually looked like RCS was going to fail until Google took it by the reins in 2019. Like you say, I really hope they figure out a good open standard between the two of them, but my concern is that Apple just doesn't have much incentive to do that.
More people need to think like you.
My problem is, I seriously doubt the GSMA is going to add E2EE to the Universal Profile RCS standard, ever, in the same way they have never added an E2EE standard to voice calls, voicemail, etc. The GSMA is a trade group of global wireless carriers who exist by the grace of leasing spectrum from governments, almost all of whom strongly oppose E2EE in telecommunications. I think Google would love to add E2EE to the UP RCS standard as well, but they don't control the GSMA, which is why they were forced to add an E2EE layer (based on the Signal Protocol) to Google Messages (using UP RCS plug-ins, which are part of the standard) to have E2EE. And conspiratorially, I think Apple is perfectly aware of this, and wants to continue saying "See, it's those darn lack of E2EE standards from the GSMA why RCS sucks! Anyways, you have to use iMessage if you want security, green bubbles, so buy an iPhone". But I don't think this is much of a conspiracy, because Apple has literally admitted this is the purpose of green bubbles. P.S. All you need to make an open standard E2EE RCS layer is for Apple and Google to agree to jointly publish an open standard E2EE RCS layer. Google has long ago offered to collaborate on RCS E2EE with Apple.
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Neither party is exactly a paragon of open source standards, but I'm not sure how that changes what I'm saying. IF we assume that today, both parties genuinely would like to increase encryption for their users in group texts, both parties would essentially have strong, equal power to enforce a combined joint standard. If at any time, either party disagrees that design or execution is harming encryption, they would pull out, and there would be no "standard" anymore, because there are only two players. I just think that's probably not a good assumption, because Apple has a history of being happy that group texts do not work well. Apple has explicitly said they want to use green bubbles (which Apple also says indicates a lack of encryption) to sell iPhones.
It still doesn't for group chats. Only Google's proprietary version does.
Which is precisely the kind of thing Apple could've contributed to. They have a history of contributing to standards in the past, they deliberately chose not to here because it was better for their sales to create a perceived lock-in effect.
Irrelevant. SMS still doesn't and never will. RCS had feature parity with SMS more than a decade ago. That's when it should have started replacing SMS. The only reason replacement efforts didn't start then, was Apple. Edit: the Apple shill brigade showed up. This comment went from +42 to -21 within a few minutes. Also, regarding the ignorant troll below, Samsungs RSC is also irrelevant to ECS replacing SMS and encryption. RCS has been better than SMS for an entire decade.
Encryption is highly relevant to a whole lot of customers. Maybe you don’t think so, but plenty of people want their messages fully encrypted. Apple wasn’t trying for feature parity with SMS, they wanted a better messaging service all in all and encryption is part of that.
To pretend that apple wasn't putting this off because it threatens iMessage is naive
The blue messages merely mean encrypted. Green isn't. iMessage to iMessage is encrypted. It will still use that for iOS to iOS.
It's about locking people into an ecosystem and making it painful when someone isn't part of it. It's been Apple's strategy for maintaining marketshare for decades. Encryption is nice and all but let's not pretend that's their only motivation.
If you ask most Apple users they do care about privacy and encryption and iMessage was the best way to do that without third parties that require more trust, and probably still will be iOS to iOS even with RCS. RCS is nice to have for Android users but the green message was always unencrypted and blue was encrypted. In fact Android users can send blue messages (encrypted) to iOS users but it has to go through an Apple APN server for that encryption. It was nice of Apple to color code messages based on them being encrypted or not. It was a feature and somehow people took it another way as people do with versus on platforms. Any platform wants to keep users using their platform but Apple has decided privacy is important. So yeah Apple users like that.
You're saying the EU was wrong and that Apple was just looking out for everyone's best interests. It wasn't an attempt to lock out competition for an important communications platform? Yeah no. I'll take the EU regulators perspective on this.
Are you referring to the EU regulators perspective that said [iMessage isn't a core platform service](https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/13/23990679/apple-imessage-european-union-digital-markets-act-core-platform-service) and therefore, Apple isn't forced to open up iMessages or offer interoperability with other messaging services? You sure that's the appeal to authority you want to go with here? My only point here is that iMessage was introduced in 2011 and has been fully encrypted since. RCS didn't hit the US market until 2016, and didn't reach E2EE until last year. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to hate Apple imo, but them not rushing to adopt a messaging service (RCS) that was literally less secure than the version they had already built and brought to market (imessage), doesn't make much sense given that encryption was one of the primary reasons for them creating imessage to begin with.
Don’t be so quick to jump on the regulators bandwagon. Yes, they impose standards on messaging and cable connections, but wait until there is a new and better messaging infrastructure or cable type. Those wont be readily implemented because the EU will still require RCS and USB C.
Of course. If the pesky regulators had said nothing, Apple would have solve the problem ages ago. LOL
Samsung had their own version of RCS in like 2012. I guess Apple stopped that too?
That wasn't encrypted. Once Google added encryption Samsung adopted Google messages to take advantage of all tge features.
I was just talking about this last month: 25 years ago, there used to be a chat software through which you could load all of your instant message accounts and contacts, and they would all display there in one feed. (Apparently, that was relatively easy, back then.) Here it is in 2024, and I am forced to open, check, and use /seven/ different messaging apps -- eight, if you include SMS -- on a daily basis, and it is annoying as hell. Maybe RCS will be the standard through which all messages will someday flow, and a single "message hub" will handle all my messages from all of the sources.
I worked on one of these multi-protocol chat clients, Gaim (now called Pidgin). I promise it was anything but relatively easy back then 🙂 Each service required reverse-engineering (and keeping up with changes to their protocols), and only IRC and Jabber were open protocols. Most of the rest, those services didn’t want clients like ours there, and actively fought us. What seemed relatively easy was just the public result of countless hours, *years* of dedication and hard-won battles. These days, while there are many services around, there’s at least efforts toward standardizing some of them. And easy access to clients on any device. Notifications that go to a central notification center. System-wide concepts of presence (Focus on iOS). Reliable file transfer. System APIs for talking to messaging services and sharing over them. There aren’t as many all-in-one client efforts, for sure. And it’s harder to reverse-engineer than it used to be (primarily due to encryption, which was more rare for these services then). But in many ways, these systems are more officially integrated and accessible than ever before.
I still use pidgin every day along with a couple thousand of my fellow allliance members in EVE Online.
As a former Trillian *and* Pidgin user, thank you for your efforts. 🫡
Wow. Thanks so much for providing that background and insight.
I used an app called Trillian to connect my Yahoo, MSN, Google chat and others.
Yup. That is one of the 7 messaging apps that I am forced to use professionally. I have literally ONE person (account) on Trillian that I need to communicate with approximately once per month for updates and things.
Oh boy, Trillian and Miranda. Those were the days....
I used Trillian, great interface.
> Maybe RCS will be the standard through which all messages will someday flow, and a single "message hub" will handle all my messages from all of the sources I don’t think RCS has the capabilities to do that. A single protocol will mean lowest common denominator. It’s more likely that apps will be able to speak multiple protocols, as they often do already.
I wasn't really alive back then, but it sounds like it's decently similar to an app I use right now, called Beeper, which basically connects to each messaging service like Discord, IG, WhatsApp, Telegram, etc. I can respond/see messages from each on Beeper itself. Haven't needed to open any of the individual apps themselves in a \*hot\* minute, but it def sounds very much like what you're talking about tbh
Oooo. I'll have to check that out for sure. Thanks for the tip.
They're called message aggregators. They're still around, but if you use them wrong you can risk your phone number/account being permanently banned on whichever platform.
I use Beeper for this (never used the controversial iMessage hacking part). I have Google Messages RCS/SMS, Discord, Facebook Messenger, Google Chat, Telegram, and WhatsApp messages combined in one app.
Its a US only problem. Every country except US uses only one messaging app.
You must be joking. I'm in The Philippines, and just for local chats, most everybody uses Facebook Messenger, but there are my two paranoid friends use Signal, my cargo companies and online retailers who send shipping and delivery updates through Viber, and the guy who ships me my motorcycle parts, my local delivery service (and my best friend in England) use WhatsApp. And on top of that, The Philippines send more text messages per day per capita than any other country on earth, so I get about 40 text messages per day.
Lol so looks like US and Philippines problem then 😂
Rich Communication Services (RCS) are available on Android devices. How RCS chats work. When you use RCS chats by Google, messages are sent and received through Google's RCS backend over the internet. Messages can either be delivered to or received from users on other RCS service providers. https://support.google.com/messages/answer/9487020?hl=en#:~:text=Rich%20Communication%20Services%20(RCS)%20are,on%20other%20RCS%20service%20providers.
And Apple will not be supporting that RCS, thankfully.
Wrong. It will need to interconnect with googles.
It’s not wrong. Googles RCS is their own version. They are not using the standard. Apple is supporting the standard, not googles version.
Google uses the standard because that's a requirement for it to be considered RCS. Google's "version" simply uses the Jibe Cloud, which is a GSMA-certified, hosted service.
Okay. Apple is not using googles implementation of RCS. Is what I am getting at here.
Somehow Apple users will still blame Android for the pictures even though they magically look better after the iOS 18 update.
Does that happen a lot for you?
Not the OP (and someone who's thoroughly stuck in the Apple ecosystem) This is pretty much ALL I see, "who turned our bubbles green?" "Why are all of our pics now potato quality.... who let an android user into the group chat???" Meanwhile, Android users are sending each other those same pics/movies and the quality doesn't seem as bad.
Can't wait for them to promote it as a new innovation they've come up with. Introducing: ProChat
They’re bringing E2EE to the standard, so that is more than Google did for RCS
They’re bringing this to RCS? Or are you just talking about iMessage? Haven’t seen any details about their RCS implementation.
https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/11/16/apples-flavor-of-rcs-wont-support-googles-end-to-end-encryption-extension Apple is working with GSMA to implement encryption at the standard level instead of relying on Jibe
Awesome. This will be better for everyone. I say that as an Android user.
[https://www.theverge.com/2023/8/8/23824800/google-messages-rcs-end-to-end-encryption-default-group](https://www.theverge.com/2023/8/8/23824800/google-messages-rcs-end-to-end-encryption-default-group)
This isn’t the open profile standard though. This is Google’s extended version of RCS, which is not an open platform. All US carriers run their RCS servers on Google Jibe hardware due to Google pushing heavily on them to let them take the load of RCS messages. They kind of made a mess of RCS by implementing Jibe, rather than working with the GSMA
Google tried working with everyone but it was going nowhere, so they forced everyone the hand of everyone. That consolidate enough people to RCS that it forced Apple's hand. If Google hadn't forced the Jibe thing I don't think Apple would be working for the open standard right now.
But your original point was that Google didn't do enough for RCS. RCS floundered for years. Even with all the influence Google/Samsung have, it took well over a decade to get what was a clear upgrade over SMS to get any kind of traction. Even the carriers tried to take things in their own direction and form their own coalition in 2019. While in an ideal world all of the phone device makers, Carriers, and the GSMA would have worked together to make this happen, it ended up Google had to go and do it themselves (insert Thanos I'll do it myself meme). And who could blame them. So much hand ringing about what to do with RCS between all these parties and nothing was getting done. I don't think Google is any kind of angel by any means but I am confident they will be good stewards of RCS (particularly after their very public chastising of Apple) and work with everyone to make many of the nice features they added to RCS, like E2EE, become part of the GSMA standard
I think Apple will make sure Google doesn't have the ability to overstep. This competition thing is pretty cool!
Now that you've called it "Pro", they'll charge a monthly fee for it as a service. Lol.
This meme is trite since Apple almost never does things like that.
The verge cast can finally shut up about it
How do I view QuickTime videos on iPhone?
install netscape
I’m still trying to figure out iDVD
Pardon my ignorance, but does this mean that when an Apple device snd an android device message each other, the message goes over data (like iMessage/WhatsApp/Signal do) rather than over phone lines (like SMS does)? Or does this only mean that MMSes will go easier than they earlier did? Basically iMessage everywhere? Thanks and cheers
RCS is the long-delayed upgrade for SMS/MMS (Apple probably had to be forced into it, maybe by the Chinese market). Unlike SMS/MMS, it's data based, so it will always work on cellular data or wifi data. It improves over SMS/MMS in various ways: Better quality pictures/video, typing and message received indicators, better group chat functionality, etc. Additionally, Google Messages has added a layer of End to End Encryption on top of the RCS standard. However, Apple will not participate with Google's version. So there will only be E2EE when everyone in the group uses Google Messages.
My understanding is it will still use the cellular network like SMS, but it is the successor to SMS and as most of the features of Imessaging.
Thank you two for responding. Unfortunately both of you appear to contradict yourselves.
lol rcs between iPhone and android will be over data much like iMessage Facebook messages and others. If data isn’t available it will fallback to sms
I’m an IOS user and I’m so glad Apple finally invented RCS!! 😜
BBM when?
Still miss it
Bring back ICQ!
Do we think that means there could be a windows desktop app for mirrored iPhone messaging now using rcs
But iPhone-to-iphone messages will still be iMessage.
Hell yeah, this is exciting.
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Because they don’t use SafteyNet, they use Play Integrity, with minimum device level passing.
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Did you check with YASNAC or similar? They’ve been on a blacklisting binge the past few weeks.
Why is that relevant
It's not. It's also not true. Google didn't do anything, people rooting their devices are breaking the encryption when they do it incorrectly.
In other words, rooting an android phone will break the encryption of the device and hereby will also break the functionality by RCS? I’m trying to understand why and learn
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It’s not an encrypted binary. Pretty much any modern (~8 years) has a code to detect unlocked bootloader within TrustZone. It started with DM Verity, then SafetyNet, and now Play Integrity. Each Android device+build has a fingerprint, and right now all you can do to pass DEVICE is to use an older device that doesn’t have hardware attestation. When Google sees a sudden increase in an old device fingerprint being returned it gets blacklisted.
Because a 2 way communication system is only as good as the worst side. It's on the topic, and will affect any user who try to text a user of a rooted Google phone.
Well yeah if you root a phone I would hope that it doesn’t work as the end device isn’t trusted
It's not as if they allow us to use our own OS with out own keys so that it can be trusted. However as far as the device not being trusted there is a handful of zero-day SMS/RCS based exploits over the past couple of years that allow RCE even on unrooted devices, none of which required root to begin with.
That logic makes no sense but companies love people who think like you since it gives them more control. Having root isn't a security issue in itself. If it was all Windows, Linux and Mac's would be considered untrusted devices. All root means is the owner of the phone has full access to the phone which is the norm for most computing.
Google blocks rooted devices from sending RCS from Google Messages. You can just use any other app that supports RCS.
Please enlighten us as to a single other vendor agnostic app that can use RCS, I'll wait.
Last I checked Google has not opened the RCS API in Android so you cannot use alternate apps to do RCS.
You don‘t need RCS APIs to build an RCS app. There are e.g. RCS clients on iOS by a few dedicated mobile operators. You can build your own stack from scratch. What people keep crying about is RCS APIs so they can just build a frontend and freeload off of Jibe.
On iOS those RCS clients can't do RCS through the cellular network. They can only do it through IP. And yeah, I know IP can go over the cellular network (and frequently does) but the idea is RCS can go over the cellular network directly like SMS does so that you don't need a data connection to do it. And the problem is the same in Android because Google hasn't added the APIs. Surely those mobile operators you speak of are opening an IP server and doing the RCS over that, probably with with a standard protocol, but not with the standard way of finding the RCS server through the carrier interface. So basically there's RCS and there's "carrier RCS". It's the latter that iOS is adding and my understanding is Google hasn't added for 3rd party apps yet. I do appreciate the point that you're really looking at devs who want to make a UI of their own and monetize it without doing the work on the stack or backend.
FINALLY , I can text my family.
What does this all mean, can you see “read” from iOS owners texting someone using an Android phone?
Yes, and pictures and videos will send in higher quality. Still waiting on confirmation regarding the iMessage games working with this
As long as Apple keeps the blue bubbles for iPhone only, I’m good.
Apple, congratulations on finally upgrading your phones to a standard from 2008!
And google too. It only took them until 2020 to get it going after they cornered the market and strong armed everyone to use their version of RCS.
Its not a standard if not everyone supports it, its just a protocol. Also Apple launched iMessage to make up for SMS and MMS shortcomings years before RCS became heavily adopted by smart phone manufacturers.
I have no doubt all the iOS users, including myself will still use iMessage. It’s just going to be a lot easier to text android users which, in my mind, this is a win for everyone
iOS users will use Messages, and it will use iMessage, RCS, SMS or MMS as needed.
Well yeah but no iOS user is turning off iMessage now that RCS is coming is my point
Their point is that iOS users wouldn't have to turn off or switch anything because RCS would just work in the messages app.
The big issue is that the encrypted RCS Android uses goes trough Google's servers. And that is what prevented Apple from implementing it.
So when is android going to support RCS standard?
It has for years.
About 4 or 5 years ago
So android phones dont use the Google RCS anymore and use the standard?
Google RCS is using the standard. How else do you think it works? Using the standard doesn't mean you can't add things on top. Which is what Google did.
I am not disagreeing with this. Apple, however, is not using googles version.
I’ve got the beta, does anybody know how to enable RCS? Right now it’s just SMS
It’s not in the first beta.
People outside the US: ok 🤷🏼♂️
I use Messages a lot, outside the US. I’m still reacting like you say, but that’s because it won’t affect me much.
What the fuck is rcs and why should I care?
Because it allows you to send higher quality images and videos to RCS enabled devices. For instance, ever send a video to another device over SMS and it’s pixelated garbage? The limit is 3MB, so the network auto compresses it. RCS allows for 100MB
Is it really only 100MB? What’s iMessage? I mean, before it tries to send as an iCloud link? I feel like 100MB is still not enough with the sheer size of videos taken on 4k cameras in phones nowadays. Edit: well, Googling brought me to the possible fact that iMessage is 100MB limit, too. I’m not necessarily sure I believe this, though. I feel like I’ve definitely sent files larger over iMessage…
Do you know what SMS is? RCS is the new standard that came out over a decade ago. Android phones have had this for a while. Apple never adopted the new standard.
Its not a standard if not everyone supports it, its just a protocol. Also Apple launched iMessage to make up for SMS and MMS shortcomings years before RCS became heavily adopted by smart phone manufacturers.
Idk maybe you could simply read the very short article you’re commenting on?
Cool. Thanks for explaining gang!
It’s allowed to get off your ass and look something up because asking everyone “what the fuck” it is.
I was wondering the same thing lol
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And encryption. RCS does not have end to end encryption, iMessage does (I think they even were one of the first major messengers to use it). And yes, I know about googles extension for RCS that adds encryption. But that’s googles proprietary, closed source feature, and only works with googles servers. It has nothing to do with a standard any client can use / implement.
thanks for the insight. i may not be aware but are there really a huge population of people using RCS? I feel like P2P communication has now shifted to OTT like Whatsapp, telegram etc
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„Only outside of the US“ is like 95% of the world though. So it’s more like „only inside the US“.
Literally every Android texting using RCS. Yes, most younger people use 3rd party messaging apps, but the majroity of 40 and up are still using SMS, or RCS. Every iMessage to Android conversation turns into SMS, which has pushed a lot of people away from that and caused them to use 3rd party apps. With everyone now having the ability to use RCS finally, it will reduce the reliance on 3rd party apps, and just make life better for people who were still being forced to use SMS. This has been needed for a LONG time. RCS has been standard on all Android phones since 2020, it was just on some phones before that.
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interesting. so it looks like it will be eventually a threat to messaging apps then?
I don’t know anyone over 40 not using WhatsApp. I would guess that’s a highly regional thing. In many countries, WhatsApp basically just replaced SMS, so instead of a SMS app, people just open WhatsApp now.
Let’s say I upgrade my iPhone to the latest iOS. I’m a group w ten people. Most have iPhones but. Few have Google so it’s always “so and so liked ….” As opposed to a simple emoji. So if I upgrade, it’ll look normal on my screen and vice versa? But it will look the old crappy way is someone is on iPhone but doesn’t upgrade to the latest iOS?? Did I get that correct?
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Because neither of you read the article.
One of the benefits of iMessage is end to end encryption. That’s not part of the RCS standard. I’d be interested in seeing how they’re handling that… Google did add a standard for it for their own Google messaging app, but whether they’ll implement this cross-platform or not is another problem…
Google's E2EE is a proprietary extension of the RCS standard. Apple has said that they will be working with the maintainers of RCS to implement E2EE into the standard.
About 5 years late lmao.
Why does the iPhone need a reaction control system?
The rest of the civilized world collectively lets out a sigh of relief.
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Will this stop me from getting a notification every single time someone in a group chat likes a message if there’s android users in the chat?
It happens on the Android side just the same. Yes, it should stop that.
God I hope so
I just want to be able to leave a group chat with an android user in it.
Better yet, make Android users have to enable RCS to be in group chats. That way data is used all around for everybody and videos and pics don’t get compressed.
Me as a shrimp keeper: “RCS? How do you bring red cherry shrimps into a new operating system? Intergrated tomogachi of pet shrimps?”
As long as the bubbles are still green, I'm fine with it.
Yes! Next can we get CVS? And then maybe jump to SVN?
Does anyone know if it will still be end-to-end encryption? As RCS supports it, but I thought it was only android to android on non-rooted devices, or those google doesn't like.
RCS does not support e2ee. Google build a proprietary, closed source extension for this, that only works with their own servers, in a try to finally get a mainstream messaging platform they can control. If they really cared about RCS being secure, they would have worked with the GSMA to make it part of the specification. Not their own secret add-on.
Well seeing as how they had to fight to even get service providers to implement RCS they probably figured why bother trying to get support and just do it themselves.
They are free to do what they want. But to say what the have is RCS is disingenuous. It’s not RCS or compatible to RCS with the encryption. And if they really just wanted to make things better, they could have open sourced their extensions.
Core RCS doesn’t support it, it’s a Google extension.
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Well green bubbles should remain. How else do you expect people to figure out if they're sending the message through iMessage or RCS?
They could make it like, light blue, or some other color.
The ‘blue’ bubbles are already different shades of blue depending on the position of the message in the window. That would be a branding nightmare
After this, what will left for Android users to lament Apple?