The third new feature, which is not enabled by default and which Signal recommends mainly for high-risk users, allows you to turn off not just your number’s visibility but its discoverability. That means no one can find you in Signal unless they have your username, even if they already know your number or have it … Read more
Meanwhile, Julia Weis, a spokesperson for the Swiss messaging app Threema, says that while WhatsApp did approach it to discuss its interoperability plans, the proposed system didn’t meet Threema’s security and privacy standards. “WhatsApp specifies all the protocols, and we’d have no way of knowing what actually happens with the user data that gets transferred … Read more
Meta announced today that it is rolling out new DM restrictions on both Facebook and Instagram for teens that prevent anyone from messaging teens. Until now, Instagram restricts adults over the age of 18 from messaging teens who don’t follow them. The new limits will apply to all users under 16 — and in some … Read more
A transgender paedophile claimed her wife messaged schoolgirls on Facebook in a plot to end their marriage after she started another relationship, a court heard. Abigail Waller returned to court after she began reoffending just three months after her release from a five-year sentence for child sex offences when she was known under her birth … Read more
Beeper, a YCombinator-backed startup, initially came up with an expensive and inherently insecure method to make a beta version of its app work. This method sent every message through a relay server before arriving at the recipient’s messaging client. Then, late this summer, the company landed on a breakthrough technique, originally drafted as a proof … Read more
Note: As I was getting ready to publish this piece, Beeper’s servers began faltering. TechCrunch reports that Beeper Mini had lost access to Apple’s servers, though I’m still able to send text-based messages with a bit of delay. This piece covers the experience before this breaking news hit. I reached out to Beeper to ask … Read more
Earlier this year Gill had become intrigued by how Apple’s Push Notification service (APNs) works, and how these bidirectional notifications might offer some clues into breaking open Messages. First, Gill had to better understand how the Apple ID worked, so he reverse engineered how Apple Music operated on a Windows computer. He noted the traffic … Read more
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From mid-December, Instagram and Facebook’s messaging services will no longer be cross-compatible, according to a pair of Meta support pages quietly updated. Once the feature is discontinued, you won’t be able to start new cross-platform chats, and existing conversations between services will go into read-only mode. It’s unclear exactly when the pages were updated, but … Read more
Having predominantly used Android phones, I am far too familiar with the stigma of being a “green bubble.” Whenever I message someone with an iPhone, my texts show up in iMessage, the default messaging platform in iOS, but the app switches my messages from the secure but Apple-only iMessage protocol to the dated SMS/MMS protocol. … Read more
Good news is coming to your group chat. Today, Apple said it will add support for the RCS messaging standard to the iPhone. The website 9to5Mac broke the news that Apple will release a software update some time next year that will bring support to iOS for the messaging standard, which is already widely used … Read more