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Comment by Grustaf | Hacker News Reader

> "if Apple truly cares about the privacy and security of their own iPhone users, why would they stop a service that enables their own users to now send encrypted messages to Android users, rather than using unsecure SMS?" - Eric Migicovsky

1. If Apple sees this as a gap, it is very obvious that they would address that themselves, rather than by allowing a hack to exploit loopholes in their architecture

2. Since Apple has no control over the Beeper mini client, they would not consider it safe, it could easily be spying on users without their knowledge.

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Keep in mind that this is spin — Erik's statement is ridiculous, and he knows it. To think that Apple would somehow not treat Beeper like any other bad actor hacking iMessage protocols is delulu.

Sure, that's fair. But if he knows that, why spend the time to build this app in the first place? Is it a marketing play? It did buy them a whole lot of attention.

> It did buy them a whole lot of attention.

Ding ding ding! We have a winner!

Besides the obvious attention play, he might be going for an acquisition play... "Why bother writing our own iMessage for Android when we can just buy this little company that's already done it?" There's obvious issues with that plan, but that doesn't keep delusional founders from being delusional.

Apple chose not to support Android on purpose. They know iMessage exclusivity drives hardware sales. The emails have come out proving as much.

It's the same reason they dragged their feet supporting RCS, until regulatory pressure started mounting.

exclusivity is all Apple runs on after it's tech succeeds

As much is apparent to anyone who has used Xcode or has encountered the special appeals process behind the official appeals process behind the ostensibly fair and evenly-applied public AppStore review process.

> They know iMessage exclusivity drives hardware sales. The emails have come out proving as much.

I find this incredibly hard to believe. And just because the Apple marketing department believes something is true, doesn't make it so.

Maybe I run in a weird crowd, but I've never met anyone who cares whether "text messages" are delivered over SMS or iMessage. In general most messaging I do happens over Signal, WhatsApp, Discord, or (in a few unfortunate cases) Instagram messenger.

Hard for you perhaps. Disclosures from the Apple v Epic litigation indicate it's true.

https://www.thurrott.com/apple/248931/apple-didnt-bring-imes...

I must be an idiot. Never even heard of iMessage before this debacle - I wouldnt even know I was using it.

On a more serious note regarding the Hardware sales- Apple inc does not make that much profit based on "what" they sell, its "who" they are selling to.

iMessage is the former name for Apple's Messages app on macOS and iOS. Some people still use the former name as it's a bit more distinct than the current name and/or it's what they're used to. See also iTunes/Music and iCalendar/Calendar, or people who still call macOS "Mac OSX/MacOS X/MACOS X" and so on.

iMessage is Apple's proprietary chat protocol. It's still named that -- for instance in iMessage apps and iMessage stickers. "Messages" is the current name of the user facing app that speaks both iMessage and SMS, which was formerly named "Text" when it just used SMS. I think you're thinking of the defunct iChat message client on macOS.

Ah, maybe I got my wires crossed. Was the app really never called iMessage or iMessages? My bad.

Actually not quite. iMessage is the protocol/service used by the Messages app to communicate between two iPhones. Conversely when you send a message between an iPhone and any other kind of device it uses SMS.

It’s possible that the GP is unfamiliar with iMessage because they don’t live in NA. I have neither sent nor received an iMessage for several years. I use the Messages app for receiving SMS OTP codes only and pretty much nothing else.

They didn't spend much time building this feature.

It was an acquihire involving a 16 year old who was doing it for fun.

Except they didn't hire him? He gave them some kind of info about the sms verifications, which they then had their devs implement.

The Github page for the iMessage hack said something about Beeper "acquiring" it. Not entirely sure what that means in practice since it was open source code on Github.

They contracted him

But what kind of attention did it garner? Now, we all know that these folks are pretty delusional. They spent time developing an app that everyone except them knew was not long for the world. A rational company would realize that it wouldn't live long enough to recoup any money. Releasing such a still born product doesn't make me feel warm and fuzzy about it. Hell, Google releases products that live longer than this.

Continue to watch this space, remember - He created the pebble. The cost of this "Experiment", to put forward a point at a super simple level. reverse engineering architecture and providing a service on top of this would be a huge space, if it were allowed.

but the real problem some of use have with Apple's behavior is the real underlying reasons they're doing this

I am reasonably sure that their main driver is profit which really means exploitation of people;

I consider their public arguments lies made up to cover up the fact that what they account for as profit comes from what are in the end some really ugly historical and traditional imperialistic (colonial, neocolonial, and occulted) practices

> I am reasonably sure that their main driver is profit which really means exploitation of people

Just wondering if you've forgotten what site you're on.

This is YC which exists to build companies whose main driver will always be profit.

There are companies who have come out of YC who have main drivers other than profit.

Yeah. E.g. cashing out and leaving the business to bagholders.

that's not an example (exampli gratia)

that's the generalized pattern

Weird thing to comment on, especially as it definitely is an example of something that a company may be focused on, rather than making a profit.

so buy/use something else?

> I am reasonably sure that their main driver is profit which really means exploitation of people;

What phone do you use that does not have the same issue?

I’m poorer for having read this unsubstantiated drivel.

> reasonably sure that their main driver is profit

As opposed to Beeper?

Since apple has no control over your fire extinguisher, they sent a man to securely take it from your house and dispose of it. It could have been a bomb for all you know.

Except that the iMessage system belongs to Apple, not to you

> The app doesn’t connect to any servers at Beeper itself, only to Apple servers, the way a “real” iMessage text would.

https://techcrunch.com/2023/12/05/beeper-reversed-engineered...

Do you really consider Apple's control over a proprietary protocol which they invented and maintain to be comparable to a scenario in which Apple "sends a man" to take "your fire extinguisher […] from your house"?

I've re-written this comment five or six times in an attempt to find the most charitable interpretation, but I just cannot comprehend how it made it through your filter and out onto the internet.

There's an open standard they're refusing to adopt that would be more secure than forcing users back to SMS.

Are you referring to the one that they're adopting?

Apple is adopting RCS, but as far as I can tell your reply has nothing whatsoever to do with my comment.

If you mean RCS, end-to-end encryption is not part of the standard, it is a non-standard extension supported only by the google messages app https://support.google.com/messages/answer/10262381?hl=en

Does RCS need E2E to be better than SMS when it comes to privacy/security?

Yes, it does. RCS without E2E is following the SMS model and putting your telco in charge. It uses transport encryption but that is basically meaningless when every relay sees the entire contents of the message.

Does that mean Stingrays and just regular old SDRs can still pick up RCS messages?

RCS uses transport encryption and I honestly have no idea if it uses cert pinning or server certs or the like. The bigger concern to me is that it puts your telco in charge, just like the old days of SMS. Without E2E they get to see all of the contents of messages and to share it with whoever they deem they want to share it with, which history has shown is too many people. Telcos were very willing partners in the development of RCS for a reason. And there's a reason the base spec doesn't include E2E. Telcos want a return to the good old days.

SMS is insecure and no one should use it. RCS isn't that much better and history is a lesson that it returns to a partner that isn't trustworthy.

Yeah anything that's not E2E encrypted is pretty useless for privacy/security these days. Might as well just use DMs on reddit, twitter, etc if you don't care about E2E

IMHO profiled RCS is notably worse than SMS for privacy, because the vast majority of RCS servers are hosted by Google.

SMS can be read but it is still at least somewhat decentralized. It isn't being funneled to a single party whose business model is profiling users.

i am just flabbergasted that we are living in a timeline where the phrase "proprietary protocol" is a real thing

Aren't most protocols proprietary? Every app builds their own on top of standard protocols like HTTP, TLS, and IP. Not all services are hostile to third party clients though

well, there's proprietary in the sense of "not a standard" and proprietary in the sense of "no one else can make software that uses this protocol". the latter is very weird if you think about it.

Eh not really that weird. Consider how Microsoft repeatedly reverse engineered AOL for compatibility reasons and AOL actively blocked their efforts with every update: https://youtu.be/w-7PjunSxLU

Stuff like this happens all the time and the internet has always been like this. I'm sure older users will remember even older examples

It's not a super serious comment, it's more about how ridiculous the tone of "We are doing this for YOUR protection" would be.

On a more serious note though, in the end Apple absolutely has the power of increasing everyone's capability and security by doing something like setting up a playbook of how iMessage could just use Signal protocol and how other actors could join in, or really anything else but doing this.

> It's not a super serious comment, it's more about how ridiculous the tone of "We are doing this for YOUR protection" would be.

Right now I can presume a basic level of device security across all iMessage threads I have. Beeper deranges that: E2EE is still there, but Beeper exposes my correspondence to device security weaknesses from other OEMs, malware, keyloggers, screen scrapers, etc. as a result of lax app marketplace security & privacy.

It seems to me to be entirely disingenuous to suggest that Beeper increases security: in fact, the opposite is true.

> in the end Apple absolutely has the power of increasing everyone's capability and security by doing something like setting up a playbook of how iMessage could just use Signal protocol and how other actors could join in, or really anything else but doing this.

I don't see why any company should be denigrated for not helping the users of another competing platform, particularly when doing so likely comes at the cost of increasing the risk to its own users.

Does Apple block imessage on rooted phones? If not, what level of device security do you really have?

In addition to explicitly prohibiting it as a violation of the iPhone EULA, Apple goes to extraordinary lengths to close the exploits which allow jailbreaking. Apple doesn't just block iMessage on rooted phones, it tries to prevent jailbreaking outright.

It being a violation of the EULA means absolutely nothing lol

If more users are sending encrypted messages over APNS instead of SMS (remember, SMS is effectively unencrypted plaintext), that sounds like the definition of "more security".

Hmmming and hawing over "OEMs... and ...lax app marketplace security" seems like quite a high bar to hold, a bar so high it ceases to be useful. Remember, iPhone users can disable passwords on their iPhone entirely; if that's not something you ever worry about, then worrying about a minority of OEM's seems like mere pretext to keep your comfy walled garden all to yourself.

The whole underlying point is that Apple will do anything to virtue signal when in reality they are making a decision on improving their profit regardless if it decreases security of its customers and other people. It is undeniable and silly to argue against.

> Apple will do anything to virtue signal

Subjective, speculative.

> when in reality

I think you mean "when in my opinion".

> they are making a decision on improving their profit

Speculative, and "improving their profit" is clumsy enough vocabulary that it's a red flag on continuing to discuss this with you.

> regardless if it decreases security of its customers and other people

The plurality of countervailing perspectives in this thread – which you have failed to address or refute, as far as I can tell – ought to indicate to you that it is arguable that Apple's decision in this case increases security of its customers.

> It is undeniable and silly to argue against.

I'll let others judge who seems silly here.

You know, one doesn't really even need to read the whole of your comment to know your way of "debating" is dead in the water. Take the argument as a whole. "Isolating" parts of it just makes you look like you're debating for flat earth or the like lol. "Red flag" rofl grammar police

My point stays exactly the same. You haven't said anything real against it.

> a basic level of device security across all iMessage threads I have

Is that really true though? Jailbroken phones, iMessage may still work. Any device security gets thrown out the window.

You also can't expect everyone to have an Apple device for security, which we've seen time and time again SS7 being weak - So is the requirement to remove SS7, for everyone to jump on the Apple train?

I see Beeper as doing Apple a service, not so much a competing platform, but a gateway to the iMessage ecosystem - 'Hey, this would be pretty cool to use without this app and have it native' vs the 'Only Apple devices can use this.'

> Is that really true though? Jailbroken phones, iMessage may still work. Any device security gets thrown out the window.

Apple closes exploits which allow jailbreaking, precludes it in the EULA. What more would you have them do?

> Apple closes exploits which allow jailbreaking, precludes it in the EULA. What more would you have them do?

Preventing jailbreaking is not a good thing, in part since that's what allows us to check on what Apple is doing on the device, in regards to privacy, security and e2e encryption. If nobody can check, do you suppose we just accept their statements about the device as fact?

> comes at the cost of increasing the risk to its own users.

iMessage using SMS to communicate with Android devices increases the risk to iOS users. Apple customers are still Apple customers when they communicate with Android users.

Every risk you describe is still present in the current implementation of iMessage when communicating with Android users, except the risks are much greater because SMS is much easier to exploit and intercept than an E2EE protocol would be.

A message platform that forces Apple users to use an insecure protocol when communicating with Android users decreases the security and privacy of Apple users.

So even an imperfect implementation of real E2EE between Apple and Android users, even with all the risks you describe above, is still an improvement in security over what we have right now: a situation where Apple forces iMessage users to use to what is quite possibly the least secure communication method possible when communicating with their friends and family in different ecosystems.

It's not necessarily about helping the users of another competing platform, Apple users who are using normal iPhones are sending unencrypted and unsecured messages to their friends and family members because Apple is more interested in vendor lock-in than it is interested in making sure that its customers are able to communicate securely with their contacts.

The idea that Apple users would suddenly stop caring about security or that they wouldn't want their conversations encrypted just because they're talking to someone else who's on an Android device is very strange to me -- it suggests that Apple is willing to sacrifice security for paying iOS users just to keep Android users from seeing any of the benefits of those security improvements.

Yes, there may exist reasons to distinguish between locked down vendor-controlled devices where users do not have the autonomy to change device settings that could damage encryption, and devices where users do have that autonomy. I understand that concern, even if I think it's usually disengenous. But there is really no reason and no excuse (especially now that we know how easy it would be for Apple to take its encryption multiple-platform) for going beyond distinguishing between those devices, and going so far as to actively drop all security measures and all encryption from those conversations. It's like saying that because a window can be broken we might as well take the door off of its hinges and put up a "burglars welcome" sign -- and, incredibly, it's claiming that anyone who tries to replace the door without permission is somehow decreasing security. Apple doesn't just distinguish between controlled and uncontrolled environments, it removes the door entirely by dropping its users into a messaging format with no end-to-end encryption at all. It's a bad policy that hurts Apple users and decreases their safety.

What? Does a fire extinguisher connect to Apple servers? Does a fire extinguisher secretly being a bomb affect the security of others? I don’t know if you could have come up with a worse metaphor.

If you think about it, blocking an app and stealing your fire extinguishers are both actions that a person or corporation could theoretically do. Since they are both actions, they are equivalent. Therefore blocking an app, burning down your house, baking a pie, writing a sonnet, doing a backflip are all the same thing.

Ahhh and to think all this time I thought I knew what a metaphor was. It’s literally any comparison! Silly me!

It’s spooky. If you think about it if Apple can block an app what is to stop them from breaking into your garage and modifying your car to talk like KITT from Knight Rider but instead of being helpful it makes mean remarks about your clothes that make you cry?? What if Apple filled your refrigerator with concrete? They could build a brick wall in front of your house and paint a replica of the outside on it so you run into it like a looney toon!

Shit. E2EE encrypting my refrigerator brb

Really, your comment is equivalent to a black hole or pomegranate, since they’re all things.

I didn’t even realize my mind could expand to this level.

It was always that level! Those are both things too!

Ok giving up software to become a monk now.

It's a new more advanced fire extinguisher that is 'smart' and has a touchscreen and it smells really nice* and what's even better,

it's going to become illegal not to have one in california! so you better invest NOW!!!

go to double U double U double U blah blah blah dot yadda yadda yadda

*full disclaimer, this technology is patent pending**

**doubly full disclaimer, "patent pending" in the sense that the invention is still to be invented, the panel of experts said 20 (more) years!

It does work as a metaphor because if Apple could force you to use their iExtinguisher and ban others they absolutely would, with the argument that they are improving fire safety.

It's time that we as an industry push back against Apple and Google.

The smartphone is the single most important device for modern life and society. It's news, photos, communications with loved ones, work, entertainment, food, paying for practically everything...

And it's just two companies. Two companies with an iron grip over such a wide and diverse set of functionalities that, taken together, should be as inalienable as free speech.

- They control what you can put on the devices (or in the cases where they're open, they scare you or make it exceedingly difficult).

- They tax all innovation happening on the platform. Because web is second class. If you build an app, you have to pay for ads against your own brand. You can't have a customer relationship (yet Google and Apple get that). You have to keep up with their release cycles on their timeline. They can deny you or ban you at any point. They take 30% of your margin. You're forced to use their billing. In many cases, they actively develop software that competes with you.

- They're extremely user hostile. The devices aren't easily repairable, the batteries force upgrade cycles, and they do stupid things that make your kids want to buy the most expensive model for clout. Green and blue bubbles, etc.

- On top of this, they're gradually eating away at every related industry. The music industry. The credit cards and payments and finance industry. The film industry. It's all getting absorbed into the blob that is the locked down smartphone.

- They turn their devices into "CSAM detection dragnets" (read: five eyes, US, China, and every other entity that wants to surveil).

This is fucking absurd and it needs to stop.

We need more than two device and platform manufactures.

Apps should be at least one of: (1) portable, (2) freely installable from the web without scare tactics, (3) web should be first class / native

The device provider shouldn't be able to use their platform play to maintain dominance. The cost of switching should be zero until there are enough new peer-level competitors.

I could keep going... the status quo is a tax on the public, a tax on innovation, and a really overall unfortunate situation.

The alternative phones outside the duopoly exist.

Sent from my Librem 5.

Have Purism solved the problem where it will randomly burn through an entire battery charge in an hour?

That basically makes it a non-option for the overwhelming majority of people, and it was still an issue 6 months ago.

I really want to like the Librem but it's hard to justify the price tag when you're going to have to carry another phone around with you anyway.

I use a Librem 5 as my daily driver without carrying a second phone around.

The battery thing is not an issue for me in practice. I carry a spare battery (they're swappable), but I never actually need it because there's USB-C chargers everywhere I go, and I made it a habit to plug it in whenever I can.

Look, no offense but it sounds like the battery thing is an issue for you in practice, as evidenced by the fact that you carry a spare battery and plug it into a charger multiple times per day.

A phone should adapt to your lifestyle. You should not have to adapt your lifestyle to your phone.

Linux phones can't benefit from 10 years of software optimizations for the battery life, so yes. However it's good enough for non-heavy usage already.

I don't have such issue. The battery is sufficient for one day unless I use the phone heavily.

Edit: Actually it did happen when I opened a Firefox tab with a heavy js and left it open with deactivated suspend, which you shouldn't do on any phone (and even then it's more than a couple of hours).

Agreed with all of this. I'm happy to see others who care about these issues- all too often on HN that's not the case :-\

> They take 30% of your margin.

that would be nicer than the current situation where they take away 30% of your revenue

It's really not just two companies trying to pull this bullshit. Microsoft and Samsung also try to do the "ecosystem" bullshit. If you try to use a streaming music service other than Spotify, you'll eventually notice almost all social media has an exclusive connection with Spotify to do things like share "now playing" songs or your playlists or whatever. Retail companies tried to force everyone into their payment platform lol. Banks try to force you to only use iOS or locked-down android distros. (Some are even deprecating their desktop websites and forcing you to download the app now, apparently).

There's also the mountain of 'mobile first' (aka mobile-only) garbage out there, and stuff that is nerfed on mobile unless you download the app (so they can squeeze telemetry out of you).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending Apple or Google - far from it - but I'm saying there's a lot of real crap going on in tech right now.

To be fair, I am a curious person and use both android and iOS. I use onedrive and (sigh) icloud for storing photos. On my android phone, I can actually have it sync pictures to onedrive and nowhere else (and it'll free up the storage, even! I think...). On iOS it either fills your phone up and then nags you constantly to manually delete pictures, or you use iCloud. There's no other choice.

> 2. Since Apple has no control over the Beeper mini client, they would not consider it safe, it could easily be spying on users without their knowledge.

Since I have no control over iMessage, I would not consider it safe. It could easily be spying on me without my knowledge.

The basic assumption here is trusting Apple, provided that numerous security researchers have access to the platform. If you don't trust Apple, don't buy their products.

It’s a two party marketplace. Even if I don’t like Apple, the alternative is not great either.

"they would not consider it safe" is from Apple's perspective, which is the only thing that matters when Apple is the steward of legally and technically enforcing who can use their APIs.

Sure. They have every right to do what they're doing. I'm just mocking Apple because I think their implication that they're the only trustworthy entity is ridiculous. We have no reason to trust them any more than we do Beeper or any other company.

If Apple actually cared about security they'd implement an open protocol that is provably secure. Imagine if they supported something like Matrix. But that's clearly not their primary concern here. It's just a convenient excuse to maintain their walled garden.

Which is why most people (should) opt to use a cross platform messenger, such as Signal.

If signal would officially allow third party clients, non-phone-number-bound users and maybe federation that'd be great.

It does not.

Signal does allow third party clients, Beeper is one. I agree about other things, and would expand on the list.

They do not officially and discourage it. Moxie and the rest of the company has been extremely clear that all third party clients are not considered supported or allowed, regardless if they can and do interact with signal services.

Useful (though somewhat dispiriting) to know. I would feel a lot more forgiving toward Signal's UI shortcomings if I had a choice of alternative front-ends.

Does iMessage allow third party clients? No? Then why the double standard?

I'm saying that if we hold something to a higher standard lets actually hold them to a higher standard.

Is signal better than iMessage? Probably. Should we ask for them to be better than they are? Yes.

It looks like we are comparing standards here, and that neither passes the bar.

As very recently made evident, Signal spends a significant amount of money maintaining their phone-number-bound infrastructure, with an entirely plausible, reasonable, user-focused reason for doing so. As a Signal user, and donator, I’m 100% okay with the trade-off they’ve made, and would hate to see it reversed just to appeal to some nerdy pipe-dream for how services should work.

> As very recently made evident, Signal spends a significant amount of money maintaining their phone-number-bound infrastructure, with an entirely plausible, reasonable, user-focused reason for doing so.

If there is some recent revelation that makes phone numbers all of a sudden a secure, portable and censorship-resistant identifier please link me that.

Until then I'd prefer to not have my private communication determined by telephone companies that often have not cared for either security, censorship or privacy. Regardless of signals e2e encryption having my access to the network determined by a telephone company is not the right way to go.

I'll continue to restate the thing that made me immediately quit Signal forever - I made an account, and 10 minutes later, it had alerted someone I hadn't talked to in years that I had an account, simply because they had my phone number at some point in the past, and they messaged me.

For a nominally privacy focused app, for them to literally alert people to my new Signal account I'd gotten to securely message someone violated all trust I had in them. What's to stop someone from just adding a Contact for every single valid phone number on their phone and then getting an alert for any time anyone makes a Signal account? I may as well just use Facebook then.

As pointed out below, "they" is Apple, but I would also assume that at least 99.9% (really) of users would trust Apple more than Beeper, i they had to choose.

Let’s add a few more 9s to that, just to make it even more realistic.

If you don’t trust Apple, then obviously you don’t use it. If you do, then it shouldn't be possible for a 3rd party client to break that trust. Users only see iMessage vs no-iMessage and have no other way to identify the client to decide for themselves whether to trust it.

Not what he said. He said he doesn’t trust them (safe). The question you should be asking is why do you?

Because they’ve proven to be the most trustworthy and if you can’t trust the manufacturer of the device and OS you also can’t trust any app running on said hardware.

> If you do, then it shouldn't be possible for a 3rd party client to break that trust.

A correctly implemented end-to-end encrypted protocol would be safe for all participating clients.

The only way to break that security is by copying messages outside the protocol in the app itself.

Neither of us knows whether iMessage or Beeper Mini does this. To bring up the possibility is to criticize both apps equally.

> A correctly implemented end-to-end encrypted protocol would be safe for all participating clients.

As long as the clients are closed source, this is a circular argument. The client itself is a vector. Not just for a good E2E implementation but for the 3rd party company to not outright steal everyone’s messages, create a backdoor, etc. You have to be willing to trust every client used in the thread.

That was my second point.

If we must be willing to distrust one closed source client, then we ought to distrust both.

This is tantamount to saying we should only trust open source software. If that’s your point, then you lost me. If not, then it’s obvious that some companies are more trustworthy than others. (P.S. the many active exploits found in core low level open source software after months or years because despite the source being open almost no one audits it because they’re cheap and/or assume someone else is doing it)

Well why in the world would I trust iMessage and distrust Beeper Mini?

Are you seriously asking why someone would trust Apple over a small generally unknown Android-only app company?

I don't actually think it's that unreasonable. Apple has broken people's trust many times and come out just fine in the end because they are a huge company with many products participating in many markets. A small company like Beeper is dependent on a small user base and a significant breach of trust could easily spell the end for them.

That said, I don't personally trust either of them. When it comes to matters of security, I prefer open protocols which can be proven to be secure over pinky swears from companies.

Trust is generally something you build and lose, rather than something you are given by default. That reputation can be a massive asset or liability.

The level of trust I currently give in Beeper is that identity verification happened such that someone could potentially be prosecuted for abuses after-the-fact.

They have not built up a reputation, and in the face of potential scams or privacy abuses their reputation may not be as valuable as the user information they can gain access to.

Small incidents can cause significant reputation harm to Apple, and those equate to billions of dollars lost in corporate value.

Even the recent notification monitoring announcement harms their reputation, where the government itself mandated non-transparency. (For this reason, I somewhat expect they are trying to design an oblivious notification system, where role separation prevents a single intermediary from knowing both where a notification is from and where it is going to.)

Apple has done plenty to lose my trust, and very little to build it. But that's not really the subject at hand, though I do see where word choice is misleading here.

You just brought up a better word: "liability". I'll go one step further: "attack surface".

When it comes to security in software, we don't need to work with many unknowns. The unknowns we do work with are the attack surface. By presenting a greater domain of unknown behavior, closed source software effectively presents me (the user) a larger attack surface. Sure, I could trust that the extra attack surface is actually covered; but I can't know. With open source, I don't have to trust, because I can know instead.

If I am to choose between open and closed source software, then I am choosing between knowledge and trust. That is a completely different position than choosing between closed and closed: trust vs. trust. So long as any securely-designed open-source messaging app exists, iMessage is at a disadvantage in end-user security. Even if Apple can know for certain that iMessage's attack surface is not larger than an open-source alternative, we the users can't. Closed source software will always present a higher demand for trust.

> Since I have no control over iMessage, I would not consider it safe.

Generally fair assumption. There's been some research (both positive and negative) around their E2EE claims, though AFAIK much of what's known about iMessage's E2EE guts has been learned through unofficial means. I think that for the vast majority of users, iMessage is probably safe enough.

As a user, you have the agency to choose a messenger app that better suits your privacy/convenience balance, though in fairness, I think even among users who care about privacy, many don't know how to judge privacy features and implementation details well.

Like others in this thread, I personally recommend Signal. It's widely available, easily usable, has been audited and researched a fair bit, and though it doesn't have a self-hosted option, it does have white papers out about its protocol which IMO are worth a read.

> Since I have no control over iMessage, I would not consider it safe.

I would trust iMessage about 95% less if I had written, or even implemented, the protocols myself, and I consider myself a pretty good developer.

If I'm expected to believe a messaging app is secure, the first thing I want is an open protocol. An open source client would be nice too, but honestly I'm fine with just the protocol.

I do not need to have had a hand in developing any of this. It's not my expertise and, like you, I'd feel more comfortable having it developed by the experts.

Spam. Spam is the reason and the Beeper guys know it.

(1) is exactly what that quote is pointing out. If Apple actually cared about its users' security, they would see this as a gap, and would have addressed it already. The fact that they haven't means that, despite all their posturing about being a security-first platform, they care more about lock-in and marketing than they do about user security.

An intentional gap? Or a bug that they've now fixed?

Fixing this bug leaves the gap intact.

It's a pretty indirect gap, since it has nothing to do with Apple's infrastructure, it's about users choosing to interact with users of non-Apple platforms using insecure means. There are dozens of secure cross-platform messenger apps that they could be using, and SMS is a legacy technology.

Putting aside that I count at least two glaring examples from this list[^1] in your reply, I suspect Apple would argue that it is in fact _solely_ preoccupied with its users' security: that's why iMessage is end to end encrypted and Apple does not offer 2FA / OTPs via SMS. Apple does not generally try to mitigate security issues which are beyond its control (e.g. non-Apple devices, protocols).

[^1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies

> and Apple does not offer 2FA / OTPs via SMS

Last time I checked, Apple still used security questions any hacker can get answers to on Facebook. I'm not all that confident about Apple's approach to account security.

Apple has the ability to control security issues on Android: they can release an Android app, like every other E2EE messenger out there.

Apple chooses not to, and it's their choice, of course. It doesn't care about the privacy of it's non-users, and it doesn't care about the privacy of its users when they communicate with non-users. From what I can tell, it only cares if you stay within the Apple bubble.

Those security questions are now very much optional. I made sure to lock down my Apple account. If I lose either my password or access to all my devices, the only thing that can unlock my account is a long printed code or permission from a trusted family member. My account no longer has security questions.

Apple is doing it optionally because they're trying to balance two opposing forces here: helping its users access a locked account, and giving users tightly locked accounts.

My points are narrowly related to the parent's assertion that Apple preventing Beeper Mini interoperability / allowing SMS is evidence of their convictions relating to privacy being hokum, but since you're not one of those 3 month old accounts I see making specious arguments…

> Last time I checked, Apple still used security questions any hacker can get answers to on Facebook.

Apple's default for a number of years has been to use trusted devices IIRC. Their kb article on resetting a forgotten Apple ID password even suggests that it's better to wait until you're back with a trusted device than to immediately try to reset without one, suggesting that the process is somewhat intensive and perhaps subject to human review? I just kicked it off online and the first question _is_ to confirm an obfuscated cell phone number, but I can't imagine that after that it's mother's maiden name dreck?

> Apple has the ability to control security issues on Android: they can release an Android app, like every other E2EE messenger out there.

Which would thus expose them to security weaknesses of a device and OS they do not control, and potentially expose iPhone and iOS customers to increased risk should an Android iMessage user's phone have malware, or screen scraping, or keylogging, etc.

> Apple chooses not to, and it's their choice, of course. It doesn't care about the privacy of it's non-users, and it doesn't care about the privacy of its users when they communicate with non-users. From what I can tell, it only cares if you stay within the Apple bubble.

Nail on the head, but I do think that folks overstate the simplicity with which Apple could provide a comparably secure iMessage experience on Android.

Last time I checked, Apple still used security questions any hacker can get answers to on Facebook.

Check again.

I recently reset a forgotten iTunes password. This required:

  - An email verification

  - An SMS verification 

  - A verification code sent to another device on the account

  - A ten-day wait

  - Another second device verification

That's 5FA authentication just to reset a password.

The days of answering personal trivia questions to reset passwords are long gone.

> Apple has the ability to control security issues on Android: they can release an Android app, like every other E2EE messenger out there.

I'm surprised I haven't seen this mentioned more. They could even make a green (or whatever colour they wish) iMessage bubble to denote that it is not from an Apple device. Seems like it solves all the problems people present with E2EE/iMessage with Android interop. On the issue of spam, which I feel is just grasping at straws, You could allow blocking unknown non-Apple iMessages by default. Unless I am mistaken, this really only leaves the walled-garden as the thing that stops Apple from implementing something like this.

In fact, you could even only allow Android iMessage conversations that include at least one genuine Apple device. This combats the argument that they shouldn't have to give resources away to Android users for free. This would be added-value to their own customers by providing more streamlined messaging with their Android contacts. Such as situations where group chats are forced to swap to MMS for a single Android user, sending pictures/video to a friend, etc.

They do offer 2FA via SMS. This is AFAIK the ONLY option for Android/non-Mac users. Why are those users less deserving of decent security? Apple still sells and offers services outside their platforms, so they're still customers potentially with hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of purchases and CCs attached. FFS Nintendo has better 2FA options than Apple for non-Apple platforms.

> Why are those users less deserving of decent security?

Because they don't own an Apple device or have iMessage, which is the entire point of this discussion?

So Apple only cares about security for Apple platform users and not all users of Apple services? Such commitment to security...

This is like making a car where the airbags only deploy if you hit another car of the same brand.

Sure, if this car is super safe it may be better if both you and the other driver both had it. But it is clearly better to have airbags, even if the other car is less safe than it could be if it was from the first-party brand.

It is one thing to not try to mitigate security issues outside their control and another thing to remove possible security because you don't control it entirely.

A third party client in iMessage allows for spam attacks, and (worse) malicious payload attacks. It’s very much in the interests of security that Apple fence them out.

I don't think it's at all clear that the approach you describe is working: https://www.wired.com/story/imessage-interactionless-hacks-g... (2019), https://www.forbes.com/sites/daveywinder/2023/06/02/warning-... (2023)

Of course, this is a hard problem. I'm not saying Apple is bad at security, many good messaging platforms run into these kinds of problems. But the way you fix these problems (and the way Apple in fact did fix the bugs above) was through patching their own software, not by trying to control what attackers can send.

If security researches can send a malicious payload attack that compromises iMessage, the solution is not to make sure they can't send that payload (which would be impossible to guarantee anyway), the solution is to patch iMessage to no longer be vulnerable to that payload attack.

One hopes that the only thing preventing your iMessage client from being compromised is not whether or not the attacker has a spare $1,000 lying around.

The longer term solution is to stop using memory unsafe languages.

Regardless, when a buffer overflow happens, it's not reasonable to say, "well, we'll just make sure nobody sends us badly formatted or maliciously formatted data. As long as only iPhone users can send us data then we can trust it."

The actual solution is to make the client/server not be vulnerable to malicious payloads that would cause a buffer overflow. Whether you do that by patching bugs individually or switching to a memory safe language, or whatever strategy is used -- "don't send our messaging platform bad data" isn't a security fix.

On macOS iMessage is scriptable in various ways (both officially supported and unsupported), so the security argument doesn't hold water to me. It's a business decision.

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