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Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

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Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#511

Post by kelnos »

JohnFen wrote: post #312
commoner wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can deregister your phone number from Messages by Google here: https://messages.google.com/disable-chat This is similar to Apple's iMessage deregistration page.[1] Google has been funneling RCS messages through its own servers to bypass wireless carriers, which were slow or unwilling to directly support RCS.[2] Unfortunately, this has centralized RCS communications through Google and allowed Google to make end-to…

That's interesting! I wonder why the phone didn't automatically deregister when I disabled RCS, or why there wasn't at least an informative popup telling me this was necessary.

That's the dumb thing. When you disable RCS on your phone, why doesn't the phone just send that same API call that gets called when you visit that web page and deregister?

(Ditto for Apple, if that's still an issue over there with iMessage as well.)

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#512

Post by kelnos »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #430
madeofpalk wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So. What exactly is the "RCS" that Apple is supposedly going to support? RSC for Android? RCS for Pixel? RCS for Samsung? RCS for Verion? What's the point of a standard that has 5 different ways it's fragmented on the same base platform?

From the article: "Later next year, we will be adding support for RCS Universal Profile, the standard as currently published by the GSM Association."

So in other words, RCS without E2EE.

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#513

Post by kelnos »

FactolSarin wrote: post #418
616c wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish RCS could somehow be merged with IETF MLS specs but I know that is apples and oranges and not so possible. The RCS proprietary encryption bit is very sad. Oh well.

Google's RCS encryption scheme isn't really proprietary, it's the Signal e2ee scheme. Granted, it's bolted into RCS and not part of the standard, but it's not 100% closed either. It's like a standard added to another standard in a nonstandard way.

The key management is proprietary, for some reason. Can't build an interoperable impl without that.

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#514

Post by wtmt »

TerrifiedMouse wrote: post #230
throw0101a wrote: post #33

> Breaking: Apple will support RCS - the green bubble shame set to end Note that the green bubble could be kept for other reasons: RCS is a major improvement over SMS/MMS, but there could still be functionality that isn't on par with a completely in-house system like 'iMessage'. The green/blue distinction may still be useful for setting certain expectations on how things work.

If carriers can charge per RCS message like they do with SMS/MMS, usually after X amount used a month, Apple needs to make it a different color from iMessages which they provide for free. People have to know if they are using free iMessages when talking to other people or if they are using up their SMS/MMS/RCS quota. Edit: Maybe charging for SMSs is not a thing in your country but it is in mine. If I see a green bubb…

Here in India the plans do include free SMS, but there was a government imposed limit of 200 SMSes per day from a single SIM (this applied to retail consumers, not institutions that may want to send transactional or marketing messages). [1][2] Beyond that, the per SMS charge gets expensive. Though that limit seems to have been removed in 2020, [3] I’ve only seen plans that allow 100 SMSes per day.

Almost everyone in India with a smartphone uses WhatsApp. SMS is for receiving OTPs, transaction messages, marketing messages, spam, phishing messages, etc.

[1]: https://trai.gov.in/notifications/press-release/trai-extends...

[2]: https://www.firstpost.com/tech/news-analysis/200-sms-per-day...

[3]: https://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-techn...

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#515

Post by yieldcrv »

stouset wrote: post #456
spiralpolitik wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the trap door in this. Apple is going to implement RCS exactly as the specification says it should be implemented, no more or no less. Any incompatibilities with Android will be laid at Google's door to resolve. Having beaten Apple with the RCS stick for the last year, Google might find themselves now getting beaten back.

If RCS doesn’t get E2E encryption added to the public spec, they should highlight unencrypted messages with an even more offensive yellow bubble.

or vomit green moving gradient with the vomit emoji tap backed on it

will RCS still break most imessage group chat capabilities?

I dont really think “at least my videos will send at full resolution to android users” is really that much of a difference

multiple generations of people use phone chats for all the capabilities they offer, which is way more than higher resolution picture and video attachments alongside text

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#516

Post by pertymcpert »

Obscurity4340 wrote: post #124
Tagbert wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both iMessage and Webkit have to accept requests from unknown sources that can contain a wide variety of content type. some other content types, like EPS are themselves programming languages that could contain infiltration scripts. That is why Apple has dropped EPS support. Similar situation can happen for other kinds of image and video content. I don't know much about how iMessage communication is implemented but it…

I just laugh because Signal is way better than all of this and—wouldn't ya know—the default is "blue bubbles". They are the ultimate blue bubble to me because its almost all yours and gives you way more control than anything else like iMessage and its all audited and open for examination (theoretically)

Sorry in which way is Signal better?

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#518

Post by kalleboo »

TerrifiedMouse wrote: post #444
ThatPlayer wrote: post #425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If iMessage gets declared a gatekeeper, RCS wouldn't be enough. Not all iMessage users can send/receive RCS or SMS.

> Not all iMessage users can send/receive RCS or SMS. What do you mean? If Apple includes RCS like they did SMS then it would operate as follows: Is target an iPhone with iMessage enabled? Yes? Use iMessage. No? Fallback to RCS. RCS doesn’t work? Fallback to SMS.

Your carrier would have to support RCS, right? Do any EU carriers do that?

Even carriers that supported RCS, like Vodafone, have shut it down https://9to5google.com/2023/03/27/vodafone-rcs-messages-andr...

Apple won't make the iPhone fall back to sending RCS though Google servers (like Android does) if there isn't carrier support for it, they'll just say "there is no RCS support on your carrier" and go for SMS.

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#519

Post by doctor_radium »

JohnFen wrote: post #372
tredre3 wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you turn off RCS, Google Messages shows you a full screen prompt once a week to turn it back on. Indefinitely. And of course the prompt has a large blue button to enable, and a very small text underneath to dismiss, making it easy to accidentally enable it. It happened to me a few times already. It also tells you nothing about the downsides (that you need a data connection, mainly) that would make RCS unusable to…

> If you turn off RCS, Google Messages shows you a full screen prompt once a week to turn it back on. Indefinitely. It doesn't do this on my phones.

Indeed. Currently using an Android 13 Motorola until my Sony is fixed. It's not labeled RCS, but one of the first things I did was disable Messages Settings -> Chat Features -> Enable chat features - Use WiFi or data for messaging when available ...which disabled a bunch of other things. While I don't recall what appeared originally, the Send button for messages is labeled either SMS or MMS, so I suppose that did the trick. No nagging.

I did just find and disable the RCS Config Service, too, and testing that everything still works.

Re: Apple announces that RCS support is coming to iPhone next year

#520

Post by kalleboo »

cubefox wrote: post #474
rattlesnakedave wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy this. Customers needed no convincing from Apple. Even where iOS isn't dominant they saw their dropped and expensive SMS/RCS messages and picked up whatsapp.

You are misunderstanding the function of RCS as making different message services compatible. iMessage doesn't exist on Android, hence the necessity of an open protocol.

The problem is that RCS has completely failed at making even different RCS servers compatible.

Carriers like AT&T and Vodafone that were early to adopt RCS never even managed to interoperate with other RCS carriers - you could only send RCS to other AT&T subscribers, or other Vodafone subscribers. Then they all gave up and just adopted Google's servers. So now RCS just means "Google Jibe".

It's a failed standard. It never worked.

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