What Apple can’t do for the future: How Beeper is going to solve the puzzles of the VoIP app beta-Development
The developers figured out how to register a phone number with the app, send messages directly to Apple’s server, and have them sent back to your phone inside the app. The process was difficult as it involved deconstructing Apple’s messaging from start to finish. Beeper’s team had to think about where to send the messages, how to pull them back from the cloud, and what the messages needed to look like. The hardest part was finding a way to break the padlock on the whole system that Apple puts on connected devices to make sure they are legit.
I asked if Migicovsky would fight Apple for the foreseeable future and he said that the fact that Beeper Cloud was still functioning is proof that Apple can’t keep it out forever. He says the Beeper team has something to say for Beeper Mini. He hopes the public will one day convince Apple to play nice. He says what they have built is good for the world. We can almost all agree that it should exist.
Apple iMessage Privacy and Security: Where Do We Stand? Why Apple is launching RCS and how to clone RCS
Obviously there’s also a much bigger picture here, though. Tim Cook has said before that Apple doesn’t want to bring iMessage to any other operating systems, and executives of the company have argued about which versions to use. Apple has recently said it will adopt the cross-platform RCS messaging protocol, but we don’t yet know exactly what that will look like — and you can bet that Apple will still seek to make life better for native iMessage users.
The company’s stance here is fairly predictable: it says it’s simply trying to do right by users, and protect the privacy and security of their iMessages. Apple has taken steps to protect its users by blocking techniques that use fake credentials.