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Beeper Mini is back

blog.beeper.com

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Re: Beeper Mini is back

#311

Post by lopkeny12ko »

julesallen wrote: post #264
lopkeny12ko wrote: post #220

Beeper has caught a ton of media attention in recent weeks but I truly do not understand it. The SMS protocol has been around for decades and works perfectly fine with iPhones. If you want rich media and other bells and whistles, use WhatsApp. How often does someone whine so loudly about insisting on using the closed, Apple-proprietary protocol that their friends need to pay a monthly subscription for a third party i…

So many reasons not to use SMS: No indicators that the message was actually received (2023 and SMS is still flaky on deliveries), no read receipts, no presence notifications, no typing notifications, no encryption in transit or rest, no escaping group chat spam... that's just the high points.

All those real-time features are antipatterns that do nothing but create anxiety and a false sense of urgency. We use Slack at work, and the typing indicators/presence detection/etc. drive me (and many others) downright insane.

I agree that encryption in transit and rest are important, but there are open and verified solutions like Signal. It seems like extremely poor security hygiene to take Apple's word that their closed-source chat service is actually secure as they claim for it to be.

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#312

Post by kcb »

matsemann wrote: post #46
martinky24 wrote: post #13

These Beeper folk sound a bit entitled. As was repeatedly mentioned in the other thread [1], building production applications on top of an undocumented and unsupported (in terms of backwards compatability, etc) API is a nightmare that should be avoided. Apple has every right to change their API, if they do Beeper will go down, and Beeper will blame Apple. I understand Apple's incentives to not want to be in this situ…

When did HN get so anti-consumer, anti- hacker , anti-freedom, pro-proprietary? Them taking the fight with Apple should be applauded. A walled down proprietary message platform only a few can use is stupid to fight in favor of.

Pro-Apple

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#313

Post by jay-barronville »

ceejayoz wrote: post #294
jay-barronville wrote: post #228

I’m a former Android fanatic turned iPhone user. I still own Android devices, but my primary device is an iPhone. I haven’t had something excite me as much as this Beeper Mini situation in years—I love that they’re doing this. One of the things that got me to switch to the iPhone a few years ago was the fact that it seemed Apple was actually doing a lot of the right things when it came to privacy and security. Obviou…

> it seemed Apple was actually doing the a lot of the right things when it came to privacy and security Isn't this one of them? A security hole existed that permitted Beeper to pretend to be your Apple device. In this case, it was being used for non-nefarious purposes, but that doesn't mean everyone would. Apple's fixing that hole seems in-line with your desired "privacy and security".

> Isn't this one of them?

I don’t believe so. Beeper Mini uses Apple’s protocols the same way the native iMessage uses it; they didn’t exploit a security hole (unless you classify the device faking part as a security hole—I don’t). They maintain the E2EE flow.

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#314

Post by Xenoamorphous »

snakeyjake wrote: post #290
lacker wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best case outcome is to get publicity leading to US and EU antitrust regulators to file a lawsuit against Apple, both of which Apple loses. The conclusion of this lawsuit is that not only must Apple allow access to iMessage, they also must allow changing the default for every component of iOS - messaging app, browser, app store, let you replace Siri with other voice assistants - and to lower the 30% app store fee…

How is this an actionable anti-trust issue? iMessage doesn't even register as a messaging platform in the minds of most users globally. In the US is it dwarfed by at least three other platforms. Globally, do any of the other top ten (Apple is nowhere near the top ten) messaging apps allow third parties to spoof their service? The purpose of anti-trust is to increase competition and prevent unlawful monopolies. Apple…

> In the US is it dwarfed by at least three other platforms

Maybe because it comes preinstalled?

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#315

Post by malwrar »

Relying on the assumption of an “authorized client” is fundamentally not a reliable security or anti-spam mechanism, as this Beeper saga demonstrates. A curious 16 year old casually figured out how to make a client be “authorized”, and a motivated party just demonstrated basic interference from Apple can’t stop it from continuing to practice guerrilla interoperability. Apple might be able to sue Beeper out of existence, but lets not pretend this approach is any meaningful defense against spam.

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#316

Post by ethanbond »

dkjaudyeqooe wrote: post #299
ethanbond wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"No reverse engineering" is a pretty standard TOS item.

When did Bepper accept their TOS?

Either they're authorized to use the service and (almost certainly) signed a TOS, or they're not, in which case they're using the service unauthorized.

Not a lawyer but I don't see what else could be true here. I suppose you could say the end users are the ones violating the TOS? I don't think it'll land with any judge, "your honor we just did the reverse engineering (without signing a TOS) and sold it to our users (who did sign a TOS, but didn't reverse engineer), so we're all clean."

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#318

Post by Workaccount2 »

UmYeahNo wrote: post #249
lopkeny12ko wrote: post #220

Beeper has caught a ton of media attention in recent weeks but I truly do not understand it. The SMS protocol has been around for decades and works perfectly fine with iPhones. If you want rich media and other bells and whistles, use WhatsApp. How often does someone whine so loudly about insisting on using the closed, Apple-proprietary protocol that their friends need to pay a monthly subscription for a third party i…

I tell you what, if you're a young person you can be publicly shamed for having the wrong color bubble, or outcast by being excluded from a group chat. To you and I that probably doesn't make sense, but for a big portion of the young, phone using population being unable to participate in the iMessage ecosystem is a huge deal socially. You are essentially excluded from the friend group, you're excluded from conversati…

I've experienced this first hand, even as an adult (well 20 something). I'd be left out of group chats because MMS breaks everything. I'd even missed events because it was all planned in the group chat, and assumed someone would mention it in person to me.

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#319

Post by tinus_hn »

exabrial wrote: post #280

Apple is writing their own death sentence here. Beeper Mini's case will definitely be used against them when their anti-monopoly case inevitably comes about: 1. Forcing a monopoly when they force-migrated their users to iMessage 2. Maintaining said monopoly by keeping third parties out Best thing they could do is put third party clients into a MFI like program and loads of red tape.

A case against a monopoly with a minority market share. Good luck with that!

Re: Beeper Mini is back

#320

Post by averageRoyalty »

> We—of course—expected a response. What we didn’t expect was 1984-esque doublespeak. The statement is complete FUD. Beeper Mini made communication between Android and iPhone users more secure. That is a fact.

Is it? Their argument about a potential increase in spam (by removing the existing annoyance barrier of signing up to iMessage with a phone number before getting full access) is valid. And from their perspective, a third party app could be doing anything with the messages once unecrypted, despite Beeper's claims to the contrary.

Don't get me wrong, it's obvious Apple went looking for the first 'valid' reason to kill Beeper Mini. I also own a ~~Beepberry~~ Beepy, so I am a fan. But this isn't FUD at all, this is a potential risk to their userbases' privacy (as well as their bottom line).

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