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https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2024/12/07/apples-surprising-iphone-update-green-bubbles-end-next-week/>
*Apple's Surprising iPhone Update: Green Bubbles End Next Week*
"When the FBI warns Americans to stop sending unsecured text messages,
they mean stop seeing those green bubbles"
The saga of green bubbles versus blue bubbles is very much an American
thing-the US has been the only significant market which has held WhatsApp
at bay, and clearly when your entire social network moves to
WhatsApp-whether on iPhone or Android, all users look the same. Meta and its CEO Mark Zuckerberg celebrated WhatApp hitting the 100 million
US users milestone in the summer, and those of you in the US will have
noticed the billboards and Modern Family ads pointing out the benefits of
seamless, secure cross-platform messaging.
None of which actually killed the green bubbles. It seems that this will
come down to two government players-China's Ministry of State Security and
America's FBI. The Chinese started it-not actually MSS themselves, but one
of its arm's length hacking groups which managed to infiltrate US telco
networks. The FBI then understandably warned that US citizens should stop
sending unsecured text messages.
That's what those green bubbles are of course.
What they actually highlight it a lack of end-to-end encryption. To put it
simply, blue is secure and green is not. It doesn't matter if it's old
school SMS green or new kid on the block RCS green. Blue is still secure
and green is still not. And so, when the FBI warns Americans to stop
sending unsecured text messages, they mean green bubbles.
Cue Apple and that surprising update. iOS 18.2-now expected next week-will
allow iPhone users to change default apps for the first time. Importantly,
this includes your phone dialer and messenger, the very two apps the FBI
and CISA have pointed out should be encrypted if at all possible. As you'll
all know by now, given the headlines over the last 72-hours, standard
network calls or messages between Androids and iPhones are never end-to-end
encrypted.
And so, following the logic, iPhone users should change their default
dialer and messenger to WhatsApp or Signal or other fully secured options.
Apple offers FaceTime for calls and iMessage for texts, but both only
secure iPhone-to-iPhone, so that doesn't work. In one respect, the timing
of iOS 18.2 could not be better, but in another-perhaps for Apple and for
Google's RCS push, it could not be worse.
If enough users do change, then perhaps we can end the green bubble
nonsense once and for all. The bubbles would still be green if texting
Android to iPhone from iMessage-but if you're using a fully encrypted
platform as your default instead, this becomes irrelevant.
FBI warns Americans to stop using green bubbles (i.e., unsecured text messages)