Apple announces support for RCS in 2024

[mecarry30]

Summary

 

Apple recently announced via9to5 Mac that they will be adding support for RCS Universal Profile in 2024, which will be replacing the fallback option of SMS/MMS. It will presumably be with iOS 18, although it could also come to a 17.x update some time next year.

 

Quotes

Quote

In a statement to 9to5Mac, an Apple spokesperson said that the company believes RCS will offer better interoperability for cross-platform messages.

Later next year, we will be adding support for RCS Universal Profile, the standard as currently published by the GSM Association. We believe RCS Universal Profile will offer a better interoperability experience when compared to SMS or MMS. This will work alongside iMessage, which will continue to be the best and most secure messaging experience for Apple users.

 

My thoughts

This is pretty big news - it probably has to do with the DMA act by the EU forcing them to use open standards, which is a great thing. However, something to note is that they aren't using Google's profile but rather the default carrier one, which I believe means that they don't support default E2EE - although I believe it could be implemented. Something else that is interesting is that they are adding location sharing in their implementation, which is a nice bonus feature as well. They also say that they will be working with GSMA to improve it so I guess they're more actively involved than just adding support to it.

 

Overall, this is a good thing, but I do feel that some people will be disappointed that they aren't using Google's implementation since that comes with a lot more features people want as default.

 

Sources

https://9to5mac.com/2023/11/16/apple-rcs-coming-to-iphone/

[NavyCobra1417]

10 minutes ago, mecarry30 said:

Overall, this is a good thing, but I do feel that some people will be disappointed that they aren't using Google's implementation since that comes with a lot more features people want as default.

I'll take any improvements they can offer over bog standard SMS at this point.

Thank you, EU

[GuiltySpark_]

This is legitimately a pretty awesome thing. 

[vetali]

Gonna be great when RCS messages are still green and group chats are still arrogantly broken between RCS and iMessage users. Any step to abandoning SMS is great though.

[bcredeur97]

1 hour ago, vetali said:

Gonna be great when RCS messages are still green and group chats are still arrogantly broken between RCS and iMessage users. Any step to abandoning SMS is great though.

I mean, it makes sense to differentiate between RCS and imessage. I'd be happy if they introduced a new color as well just for RCS

You know, for easy troubleshooting. "My messages aren't sending" --> which TYPE of messages aren't sending?

[Dracarris]

3 hours ago, mecarry30 said:

This is pretty big news - it probably has to do with the DMA act by the EU forcing them to use open standards

Funny since this will have close to zero relevance in the EU

[mecarry30]

2 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Funny since this will have close to zero relevance in the EU

Wait cause nobody uses it there right?

[Erebuxy]

5 minutes ago, mecarry30 said:

Wait cause nobody uses it there right?

If you mean SMS or RCS, yes. Because most people I know in EU, use WhatsApp.

 

Edit: If more people switch to RCS from WhatsApp or EU forces WhatsApp to support RCS, then I see it as an absolute win.

[hishnash]

6 hours ago, bcredeur97 said:

I mean, it makes sense to differentiate between RCS and imessage. I'd be happy if they introduced a new color as well just for RCS

They confirmed RCS will stay as green and iMessage will stay blue.. I expect they will auto send failed RCS as SMS. 

[captain_to_fire]

Looks like communist EU has succeeded

[hu4d]

Hysterical after the Nothing news from earlier this week

[Doobeedoo]

Bah, if I had iPhone I wouldn't even use iMessage this is such a meme I've see lately. Because US iPhone users don't want to use WA or other for Android users? Such retardation, literally problem in peoples heads more than RCS thing it self.

[LAwLz]

On one hand, I don't think there is anything bad with iMessage supporting RCS. It's just another protocol it can handle which may or may not make things better in some scenarios.

 

On the other hand, I think RCS is a pretty bad protocol. The RCS most people have experienced is probably not even "true" RCS. The RCS version that Google has implemented is non-standard and some features that I would consider rather basic (like replies and encryption) will not work unless both parties use Google's versions (Google's app and Google's servers).

 

I think I read somewhere that Google will help Apple with implementing this, so chances are it will be Google's version of RCS that gets implemented. Whether or not that's good or bad is up for debate.

 

I am just worried that people have too high expectations, and may get mad at Apple when it doesn't live up to the expectations. Chances are such anger will be misguided.

 

 

 

Anyway, now that Apple is on board maybe it's time for Google to open up RCS a bit on Android? They still don't expose any APIs to implement RCS support in third-party apps. You essentially have to run Google's messaging app if you want to use RCS on Android.

 

 

Edit:

It has been confirmed that Apple's implementation of RCS will not support encryption, since that's something RCS doesn't support natively (only exists in Google's implementation of it).

On the bright side, Apple has said that they will be working with the GSMA to add encryption to the standard (unlike Google who made a proprietary extension to the standard).

[RejZoR]

1 hour ago, LAwLz said:

On one hand, I don't think there is anything bad with iMessage supporting RCS. It's just another protocol it can handle which may or may not make things better in some scenarios.

 

On the other hand, I think RCS is a pretty bad protocol. The RCS most people have experienced is probably not even "true" RCS. The RCS version that Google has implemented is non-standard and some features that I would consider rather basic (like replies and encryption) will not work unless both parties use Google's versions (Google's app and Google's servers).

 

I think I read somewhere that Google will help Apple with implementing this, so chances are it will be Google's version of RCS that gets implemented. Whether or not that's good or bad is up for debate.

 

I am just worried that people have too high expectations, and may get mad at Apple when it doesn't live up to the expectations. Chances are such anger will be misguided.

 

 

 

Anyway, now that Apple is on board maybe it's time for Google to open up RCS a bit on Android? They still don't expose any APIs to implement RCS support in third-party apps. You essentially have to run Google's messaging app if you want to use RCS on Android.

 

 

Edit:

It has been confirmed that Apple's implementation of RCS will not support encryption, since that's something RCS doesn't support natively (only exists in Google's implementation of it).

On the bright side, Apple has said that they will be working with the GSMA to add encryption to the standard (unlike Google who made a proprietary extension to the standard).

And that's the main issue. iMessage is the same, standardized rich messaging app on ALL iPhones. It's ONLY on iPhones, but it's very rich and powerful there. Messaging on Androids is a hot mess. Google is pushing RCS, but it seems not even Google is sure how to handle it themselves. It's so bad you can't even know for sure if RCS will even work with the person you're contacting. It may be RCS, it may just as well be SMS and MMS and you won't even know it, it's just recipient that will get rubbish photo via MMS for example. I wanted to check how RCS handles multimedia and I couldn't even find ANY info on that at all. If I send a photo, I have no idea what the damn thing will do to it on the receiving end. It's why I push relatives I am in contact with and we send images to each other to just use Signal. It's not as popular as Whatsapp or whatever, but I hate Facebook so I avoid everything they make. Signal is standardized within itself, handles multimedia much better and is end to end encrypted as standard.

[wanderingfool2]

14 hours ago, LAwLz said:

It has been confirmed that Apple's implementation of RCS will not support encryption, since that's something RCS doesn't support natively (only exists in Google's implementation of it).

On the bright side, Apple has said that they will be working with the GSMA to add encryption to the standard (unlike Google who made a proprietary extension to the standard).

It's important to make a distinction between, not supporting end to end encryption vs not supporting encryption.  The RCS data is still encrypted, just it's encrypted between the client and the server...instead of E2EE.

 

One of the reasons why I believe GSMA didn't originally add E2EE into RCS was the fact that carriers would be the ones involved in implementing/handling the messages with RCS.  That meant that they would have to abide by the wiretap laws in various countries, including US/Canada/EU.  That would mean any form of encryption would have to be breakable.  Other messaging companies are capable of adding E2EE and Google themselves because they aren't acting as the carrier.

 

[Dracarris]

1 hour ago, wanderingfool2 said:

That would mean any form of encryption would have to be breakable. 

Yeah fuck those laws in particular.

[saintlouisbagels]

Amazing news! I really hope this fixes group chats too.

Mine have been broken for the last couple of months, so I've basically 100% switched over to Discord for texting Android friends.