With RCS assist, iOS 18 brings an enormous improve to the cross-device Android and iPhone messaging expertise. It permits customers of each gadgets to share high-quality media and luxuriate in options like learn receipts and typing indicators.
Nevertheless, RCS chats between Android and iPhone usually are not end-to-end encrypted (E2EE). The GSM Affiliation, which developed the RCS customary, is working to repair this safety hole.
GSMA and Google engaged on including E2EE to RCS Common Profile
RCS (Wealthy Communication Companies) chats on Android assist E2EE. That is because of Google’s Jibe backend, which makes use of a Sign add-on to encrypt conversations. The present RCS Common Profile, as adopted by Apple, doesn’t assist end-to-end encryption. The GSM Affiliation is engaged on including interoperable end-to-end encryption.
“The next major milestone is for the RCS Universal Profile to add important user protections such as interoperable end-to-end encryption. This will be the first deployment of standardized, interoperable messaging encryption between different computing platforms, addressing significant technical challenges such as key federation and cryptographically-enforced group membership. Additionally, users will benefit from stronger protections from scam, fraud, and other security threats,” stated Tom Van Pelt, GSMA’s technical director, within the announcement.
In a LinkedIn submit, Elmar Weber, Normal Supervisor at Google, confirmed working with GSMA to convey E2EE to all RCS customers “as soon as possible.” Apple additionally beforehand expressed its intent so as to add end-to-end encryption to RCS chats on iPhone.
Apple dedicated to bringing RCS to the Messages app in November 2023. It then formally unveiled RCS integration within the Messages app as part of iOS 18 throughout WWDC24.
No timeline given for E2EE assist in RCS
There’s no timeline from any events concerned on how lengthy it should take for E2EE to come back to RCS Common Profile. After that, it is going to be as much as Apple so as to add assist for the most recent RCS customary to iOS. So, you may need to attend some time to get pleasure from a safer cross-platform messaging expertise.
For now, in case your iPhone is working iOS 18, benefit from the enhanced texting expertise together with your Android pals. iOS 18’s Messages app additionally has a number of different enhancements value testing, like wealthy textual content formatting and message scheduling.
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