iOS 18 comes with bad news for users.
NurPhoto via Getty ImagesAs hundreds of millions of iPhone users update their devices to iOS 18, coloring their home screens and navigating their new Photos app, the reality is that this update is more about what’s missing than what’s released. No Apple Intelligence—at least not yet, and another omission that has also been confirmed.
This bad news affects RCS—the biggest non-AI update coming with iOS 18, which brings rich messaging features to the iPhone messaging stock on Android for the first time, but which The Washington Post warns, it still leaves “conversations with Android friends [with] security and other compromises that Apple could have avoided.”
There’s still a lot of excitement as the shiny new SMS texting update v2 rolls out. “We’ve known it was coming for almost a year, but today is the day we’ve been waiting for.” Android Police he says. “The state of texting between the default messaging apps for Android and iPhone is getting a huge upgrade… Now that Apple has made iOS 18 official, iPhones can finally use the protocol intended to replace SMS and MMS.”
But those pesky green bubbles persist. this is not a magic bullet. “The drama has been going on for so long” Gizmodo says, “that we need to recognize the little things that add up to a better messaging experience.” This includes typing ellipses, reading proofs, sharing non-blurry images. But with growing pains, this often seems to depend on the generation of Android phones being texted, network conditions, and the seamless cross-platform experience we expect from other apps.
But the more serious issue is hidden from view. “In some important ways,” The Post says, “Apple’s messaging app remains stuck in the mobile phone age, which undermines the security of everyone’s messages.” While Gizmodo says: “We have to recognize that iOS users will have a different experience messaging their iPhone friends than those on Android. The version of RCS that Apple uses is not encrypted, unlike iMessage.”
So was this inevitable and unsolvable? No — not in any conceivable way. “Apple largely blames limitations on technology that combines iPhone and Android messaging apps.” The Post he says. “This is an incomplete explanation. Apple’s options also make conversations with Android devices worse.”
What this means—as I explained earlier—is that Apple and Google could have collaborated on a secure API between their messengers to fully secure content, better compete with Signal, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, or messaging in their own walled gardens. Or Apple could have delivered an Android iMessage app.
Conversely, this doesn’t really compete with the cross-platform security of these premium messaging platforms. And that’s above and beyond some of the other boring compromises that come with SMS V2 beyond a dedicated cross-platform app.
While RCS has been rolled out by Google’s managed push across the Android ecosystem, it did so with a dedicated client that adds a fully encrypted layer along with other updates. RCS itself does not include full security, and it is this limited protocol that Apple has adopted for the iOS 18 update. Apple has said that it will work with the mobile industry’s standard setters to push for an improved protocol. But that’s not coming soon. And until then these compromises remain.
The net result is that Apple’s iMessage update gives users in Europe or Asia or Africa – where the likes of WhatsApp, Viber, Telegram and others dominate – no reason to switch, and in the US, where WhatsApp is crying foul, this just supports Meta’s relentless year-round privacy campaign.
What makes it even more interesting is Telegram and the recent travails of its founder and frontman Pavel Durov. The issue with Telegram has always been the gap between its marketing and reality. Messenger plays the security card but doesn’t fully encrypt its messages either, just like RCS. Telegram’s real game has always been its rogue refusal to cooperate with the authorities—until now, one assumesand its privacy—better facilitating anonymity for users.
Durov’s arrest has left many of Telegram’s nearly billion users wondering who will now have access to messages held on ion Telegram’s servers, which are protected only by the platform’s own encryption (to which it holds the keys) and voluntary its policies.
There are other compromises with the new RCS connection between iPhone and Android—not surprising, given that the connection relies on a cellular protocol versus more proprietary cross-platform integration. If Google and Apple had intended to deliver a less boring, more secure messaging experience between Android and iPhone, none of these issues or compromises would be plaguing millions of users now.
All the up-to-date, fully encrypted, more seamless platforms—Signal and WhatsApp would be my picks—have none of these problems, though be aware of the metadata shared if you use WhatsApp. But I don’t see any reason for anyone to change their daily messenger to iMessage or Google Messages. It’s just not worth the compromises or risks.
