4 ms·

I'm pretty sure this quote from the founder is wrong on multiple levels: > “That means that anytime you text your Android friends, anyone can read the message.

I'm pretty sure this quote from the founder is wrong on multiple levels: > “That means that anytime you text your Android friends, anyone can read the message. Apple can read the message. Your phone carrier can read the message. Google… literally, it’s just like a postcard. Anyone can read it. So Beeper Mini actually increases the security of iPhones,” he [the founder of Beeper] had told TechCrunch. The phone carrier can read the contents of the unencrypted SMS. But the contents of the message never traverse Apple or Google networks. If an iPhone user's device attempts to send an iMessage, and it fails to send, then the device falls back to sending an SMS via the cellular network (actually, it's not even a fallback - the user needs to long-press the message and resend it as an SMS). The content of the message never reaches Apple because the device never sends it to them. It doesn't even send the encrypted content because it wasn't able to exchange keys. I'm not even sure it sends the unencrypted phone number of the recipient to Apple... And certainly, no part of the message is ever sent to Google's network... that doesn't even make sense. Now, maybe he's arguing "Apple can see it because they control the operating system," but that's a ridiculous argument because you may as well say they can access every iMessage too...

wkipling 3y ago
Push notifications
- chatmasta 3y ago
  Are you sure? So if I disable cellular data, I won't receive a notification for an incoming SMS? I would assume that text message notifications are generated locally on the device when it receives an SMS message.
- yellow_lead 3y ago
  SMS doesn't go through APNS, that's not how cellphones work.
sneak 3y ago
All of the SMSes that iPhone users send and receive are backed up nightly automatically via iCloud Backup, which is NOT end to end encrypted, and is completely readable by Apple. They provide it to the US government without a warrant frequently, something like data on over 70,000 users each year (per their own annual transparency report). The number is even bigger if you include the times they turn it over with warrants. The iCloud Backup also includes the “Messages in iCloud” cross-device synchronization keys, so it is indeed true that Apple can read all of the iMessages. It’s not end to end encryption if the endpoint devices sync their endpoint keys to the middle transit service. Apple’s own knowledge base article HT202303 is very clear on these points. Note also that enabling e2ee for iCloud (currently opt in, and very buggy) does not protect you, as everyone else you iMessage with is escrowing their keys to Apple in their backups, so Apple can still read all of your iMessages from the other end of the conversations even if you enable e2ee on your backup.

wkipling 3y ago

Push notifications

chatmasta 3y ago
Are you sure? So if I disable cellular data, I won't receive a notification for an incoming SMS? I would assume that text message notifications are generated locally on the device when it receives an SMS message.
yellow_lead 3y ago
SMS doesn't go through APNS, that's not how cellphones work.

sneak 3y ago

All of the SMSes that iPhone users send and receive are backed up nightly automatically via iCloud Backup, which is NOT end to end encrypted, and is completely readable by Apple. They provide it to the US government without a warrant frequently, something like data on over 70,000 users each year (per their own annual transparency report). The number is even bigger if you include the times they turn it over with warrants. The iCloud Backup also includes the “Messages in iCloud” cross-device synchronization keys, so it is indeed true that Apple can read all of the iMessages. It’s not end to end encryption if the endpoint devices sync their endpoint keys to the middle transit service. Apple’s own knowledge base article HT202303 is very clear on these points. Note also that enabling e2ee for iCloud (currently opt in, and very buggy) does not protect you, as everyone else you iMessage with is escrowing their keys to Apple in their backups, so Apple can still read all of your iMessages from the other end of the conversations even if you enable e2ee on your backup.