2y ago

Beeper Mini’s iMessage app for Android is broken, possibly by Apple

arstechnica.com

Technology @lemmy.world

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2y ago

Apple blocked Beeper Mini’s iMessage Android app, but Beeper will keep pushing

arstechnica.com /gadgets/2023/12/beeper-minis-imessage-app-for-android-is-broken-possibly-by-apple/

28 comments

Something everyone saw coming
- Meh, apple hasn't stopped Beeper Cloud after a year, so...
  
  Because they can't break that. It's using real Macs, so if they break iMessage for Beeper Cloud, they break it for their customers.
  
  @BearOfaTime
  @nave @Cheesus
  probably because the relay is running off a mac or mac vm.
Called it. I know it wouldn't make it to the weekend.
The iMessage exclusivity and elitism is far too important to Apple and their users.
- The users don’t care about the exclusivity. They care about two things:
  The features.
  The fact that it’s all the same app as SMS makes it extremely simple for ANYONE to figure out. It was a genius move for Apple to do that in the first place. Users didn’t need to THINK about using iMessage instead of SMS, the phone just did it. For the average user of these devices, that’s the kind of seamlessness it takes.
  
  The people complaining about green bubbles would like to have a word with you. They like the features. They don't specifically care about the features. It's what everyone else they want to talk to uses. Lots of other apps have similar features. So features isn't the reason people choose iMessage.
  
  The users don’t care about the exclusivity.
  There is a group of users who care a lot about exclusivity because it signifies unique status (expensive luxury goods, "ultra" version of products that looks distinctly different). There are even more users don't want to be left out of the "cool" group and that's why many people buy iPhones.
  The fact that Beeper exists proves that people (read: Android users) coveted the "blue bubble" else we wouldn't even be having this discussion in the first place.
  
  I would REALLY like a MessageKit like they already have CallKit which allows integrating other messengers with the Messages app so I can just use the one app for everything. Probably wishful thinking though.
- I think it's only important to Apple, it's not beneficial to anyone else
  
  Yes, their users don't really care. Beyond the fact that it's what everyone they tend to talk to uses. And it's annoying to them when they have to talk to people who don't.
I know Apple can work fast but I actually thought they were going to last at least another couple of weeks.
Yeah I was wondering how they were pulling that off ~~without registering the phone number or iCloud account with Apple.~~ Thanks @BearOfaTime@lemm.ee for the explanation.
In any case, this also shows that iMessage can be spoofed.
- They were registering the number and iCloud account, that's how it works.
  They just built their own ANP service to interface with GCM.
  I tried it, it used my existing iCloud account to send messages. Could do that if it didn't connect to iCloud and get the RSA key.
  As a matter of fact, to stop using it you have to de-register your phone number from iCloud.
  If you read the apps or devs docs it's all explained.
  
  to stop using it you have to de-register your phone number from iCloud.
  Ah, TIL. I was wondering that. I'll avoid it then.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Beeper Mini, the Android app born from a reverse-engineering of Apple's iMessage service, is currently broken, and it is unknown whether it will resume functioning.
Beeper desktop users received a message from co-founder Eric Migicovsky late on Friday afternoon, noting an "iMessage outage" and that "messages are failing to send and receive."
Comments on Beeper's status post on X (formerly Twitter) suggested mixed results, at best, among users.
To both outlets, Migicovsky offered the same comment, re-iterating his belief that it was in the best interests of Apple to let iPhone owners and Android users send encrypted messages to one another.
Reddit user moptop and others suggested that Beeper's service used encryption algorithms whose keys were spoofed to look like they came from a Mac Mini running OS X Mountain Lion, perhaps providing Apple a means of pinpointing and block them.
Beeper Mini's iMessage capabilities, for which the company was planning to charge $1.99 per month after a seven-day trial, were more than a feature.
The original article contains 440 words, the summary contains 165 words. Saved 62%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
If I understand how this works though, it should be a relatively easy fix. They just need to get some more device creds to spoof with.

28 comments