Despite major updates, Android Messages can’t compete with the radical new version planned for 2024.
This has been a critical year for Android Messages, Google’s answer to Apple’s tacky iMessage. After taking control of the global rollout of RCS, the long-awaited replacement for the embarrassingly archaic and insecure SMS, Google followed up with default end-to-end encryption and a host of fun features to provide the much needed lift in the standard Android messenger.
But really, the messaging war isn’t really Apple vs. Google – it’s their smartphone OS duopoly vs. the so-called over-the-tops, and in the case of non-Chinese messengers, that means Meta/Facebook. And it’s Meta that just leaked the most significant change to the messaging landscape in years—and one that represents such a radical change that it’ll be hard for Android Messages to compete.
WhatsApp is the most popular messenger in the world and Facebook Messenger is not far behind. It’s WhatsApp that popularized end-to-end encryption, secure backups, disappearing messages and media, easy-button privacy settings, and the shift from messaging to adding encrypted voice and video calls as well. Yes, Signal is more secure. But this security comes at a usability price.
Make no mistake, it’s WhatsApp’s relentless advertising of a focus on privacy and security that has driven the focus on end-to-end encryption that has seen Android Messages and even Facebook Messenger join that highly-welcomed club. All of this now leaves Telegram as the outlier given its lack of end-to-end encryption — strange given its user base.
Meta toyed with bringing WhatsApp deeper into its data collection scene, but such was the backlash from users, activists and even governments, as well as WhatsApp’s teenage streak of independence, that those moves fell through. That’s why WhatsApp remains my choice as a daily messenger for the masses. It has nailed the balance of security, privacy and usability.
While Apple users have little choice but to use iMessage given its unique role in the walled garden ecosystem, the same is not true for Android users—as much as Google would like to change that. And Apple’s latest stance on RCS — reluctantly adopting the technology halfway next year just cements the current status quo, where there’s no real Apple/Google alternative to WhatsApp.
All of this adds significant color and context to the latest WhatsApp update that has just been leaked.
The glaring Achilles heel for secure messaging is the need to provide a phone number for verification and the unique identifier for your account. Personally identifiable information means that when you message someone—even the most casual new acquaintance—you’re giving out your personal contact information to those strangers. And remember, because your number is used on most such apps and social media accounts, it provides a tool to track you from one to the other.
Messenger has been working for some time to address this critical security and privacy gap, but it requires a major rethink. Telegram has been playing with fake/anonymous phone numbers for quite some time now and more importantly given the wider security benefits, signal is now doing the same, and has shared the scope of the work involved—”we’re changing the fundamental way accounts are recognized in the Signal ecosystem.”
Facebook Messenger connects accounts instead of phone numbers itself, but the privacy issues with that are far worse than sharing phone numbers. All the proprietary messengers, which don’t allow users to be checked, profiled and then communicate, are much better than Messenger.
And so, for different reasons, none of them will change the mainstream for users around the world in the way that only WhatsApp can. There has been talk for some time now about whether WhatsApp will fix this problem. Now the usually reliable WABetaInfo has leaked out that “WhatsApp is already working on allowing users to create a username from the web client… and now a similar option [has been] locate at [beta] Android app, which allows users to search for others by their username.”
WhatsApp beta development removes the need for phone numbers
The hope is that WhatsApp’s shift from phone numbers to usernames, which WABetaInfo explains “will improve the user experience by eliminating the need for phone numbers, providing a convenient and privacy-friendly method for users to discover and connect with others in the WhatsApp ecosystem. ” will lead to similar updates across the board.
The ability to send messages without revealing personal contact information is as significant a privacy boost as anything else WhatsApp has released, meaning it “can easily share usernames, eliminating the need to explicitly exchange phone numbers.”
As always with WhatsApp, the implications extend beyond text/into voice and video calls. The idea that you can run platform-to-platform usernames for calls and messages, with no cross-app associations, and decide who can contact you and who can’t is much needed. Just scroll down the past thirteen years (if you’re old enough) of your WhatsApp chat history and you’ll get a sense of how many people have your personal contact information, assuming it hasn’t changed.
This will make it harder to track you online, make it easier to block and delete contacts from your life, and prevent organizations you send to from monetizing your data, adding to the annoying tidal wave of cold calls and texts we all get now every week.
While Apple and Google have the option of using email addresses instead of phone numbers on their core messaging platforms, their connection to SMS and in Google’s case RCS remains a core phone number. It’s also not much better to exchange phone numbers for email addresses. What we want to see are made-up usernames that cannot be traced back to people in any way.
WhatsApp and others will almost certainly continue to use phone numbers for account registrations and continuous verification through 2FA. It is unlikely that they will ever completely eliminate phone numbers from registrations and 2FA verifications. But others might. But this is much less of a problem than giving out your personal cell phone number to strangers. The move from phone numbers to platform-specific usernames will change the messaging landscape in the coming year.
For Google, the triple hits of Apple’s crackdown on Android access to iMessage and its half-hearted adoption of RCS, as well as this latest move by WhatsApp, mean its efforts to revitalize the messenger’s core with RCS and encryption seem too late to provide a viable alternative to WhatsApp. Certainly for kids and young adults starting out in the world of messaging, the idea that phone numbers won’t be shared outside of their social circle is exciting.
