Beeper is also responding to Apple’s initial statement that its app, which is based on a reverse engineering of the iMessage protocol, comes with potential risks to user privacy and security. “We deeply object to the allegation,” the company wrote, and it’s willing to share Beeper Mini’s entire codebase “with a mutually agreed upon third-party security research firm” to analyze the app for any issues.
Beeper is kind of missing the point here. Apple is not shutting it down because Beeper could do anything bad to its users — these are Android users that might not even own an Apple device. Rather, Apple is shutting it down because other people could use similar exploit (the POC appears to use an unsigned device certificate for device authentication) to send phishing / spam messages to the Apple iOS/macOS users at large. With the exploit taken away, it is harder for bad actors to leverage the same channel to attack regular users because without third party means to do this, bad actors would have to find other ways to automate attacks on a much more restricted device.
Exactly.
If you want to be mad about Apple not opening iMessage up, be mad that they don’t have an SDK, API, etc for non-Apple developers.
Don’t be mad that they’re plugging exploits that people decided to turn into a product.
If you want to be mad about Apple not opening iMessage up, be mad that they don’t have an SDK, API, etc for non-Apple developers.
There might have been anger in the beginning but after 10+ years it’s just kinda disappointment.
The only reason anybody is trying to make it a product is because there is demand and they think people will pay if they can deliver.
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Where did you see about adding E2EE to RCS?
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Yeah, I didn’t think they said E2EE. Just RCS to be able to say, “we did it!”
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Apple publicly announced that RCS is coming. I don’t get why they would need pressure to do something they have already announced.
Pressure shortens that timeline significantly IMO, similar to what happened with USB-C
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How can Beeper reasonably claim that it’s trying to “pressure Apple to achieve interoperability through RCS,” when Beeper Mini’s debut trick was to employ a Hackintosh-esque spoofing of a fake Apple device?
Apple can transform anything Beeper Mini tries to achieve into a public statement about how they patched yet another security flaw for their users. Because that’s literally what it is, and that strategy’s already been field tested now. You can’t claim anti-competitive behavior when your business model relies on reverse engineering a proprietary messaging protocol and authentication scheme for the purpose of profit (this makes it illegal in both the EU and the US, FYI.) That’s why I’m bringing up the dubiousness of the whole operation in the first place.
I don’t think Beeper even cares about making money
Then not charging anything is what they should’ve done right away. Charging a subscription for an exploit is the kind of thing black hat hackers do, and it immediately gives the wrong message to those who care. Also, the price was exorbitant for what it was – WhatsApp charged far less annually to access their own servers before they were acquired by Meta; Beeper is completely piggybacking off a trillion dollar company’s servers and using exploits and workarounds to trick these servers. This is not the kind of thing you want to charge a subscription fee for on day one.
I use beeper so that I am able to respond to messages from my pc while I work. I have iPhone because it is what my company uses, but I absolutely need a pc for the software I use.
I wish apple would just open up a web-based messenger, but then they wouldn’t be able to force people to buy Macs for everything to play nicely together.
I think you can purchase a Mac mini to handle your iMessages for you if your need them for work.
“Solve a software moat issue with a hardware purchase that rewards corporate bad behavior”
Lost you after solves issue. The rest doesn’t matter.
If I was Apple I’d wait until beeper collects a bunch of subscription fees then I’d yank the rug out and force refunds.
