It seems that Beeper Mini, a simple iMessage solution for Android, was simply too good to be true, or at least a short-lived dream. On Friday, less than a week after its launch, the app began experiencing technical issues when users were suddenly unable to send or receive blue bubble messages. The problems worsened throughout the day, with reports piling up on the Beeper subreddit. Several people in The edge They were unable to activate their Android phone numbers with Beeper Mini as of Friday afternoon, a clear indication that Apple has plugged all the holes that allowed the app to work to begin with.
Beeper Mini was the result of a comprehensive attempt to reverse engineer Apple's messaging protocol. A 16-year-old high school student managed to do this successfully, and for a while, everything ran smoothly. That effort became the basis for the new app, which requires a $2-a-month subscription. This is what my colleague Jake wrote days ago:
Its developers figured out how to register a phone number with iMessage, send messages directly to Apple's servers, and send messages to your phone natively within the app. It was a complicated process that involved deconstructing Apple's messaging channel from start to finish. The Beeper team had to figure out where to send the messages, what they should look like, and how to retrieve them from the cloud. The hardest part, Migicovsky said, was breaking what is essentially Apple's system-wide lock: a check to see if the connected device is a genuine Apple product.
Quinn Nelson of Snazzy Labs also made an excellent video which covers the technical details. The belief – or I suppose the hope – Among Beeper developers and users was that it would be such an ordeal for Apple to block the Android app that it wouldn't be worth doing. Apparently, it was easier than anyone expected.
This poses a major obstacle to Beeper's plans; The company hoped to turn Beeper Mini into an all-in-one messaging app that would eventually include RCS and SMS.
Eric Migicovsky, CEO of Beeper, contacted for comment, did not deny that Apple has successfully blocked Beeper Mini. “If it's Apple, then I think the bigger question is… if Apple really cares about the privacy and security of its own iPhone users, why would they discontinue a service that now allows its own users to send messages encrypted Android users? instead of using unsecured SMS? With their announcement of RCS support, it's clear that Apple knows they have a big gap here. Beeper Mini is here today and it works great. Why force users iPhone to resend unencrypted SMS when chatting with friends on Android?
Previous attempts to make iMessage work on Android, such as the original Beeper app, have involved complex systems with remote Macs connected to the user's Apple ID. OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei's startup Nothing recently tried to bring iMessage to its latest phone, but that plan was quickly derailed by security and privacy concerns. The Beeper Mini method, which actually communicated with Apple's own servers, was the most impressive attempt yet. But unless the company can somehow get around Apple's block, it will be considered a very fleeting block.
