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empezar

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 14, 2006
144
1
Hello.

I have a pretty annoying problem.

I recently sold my iPhone (upgraded to a S3, never been happier about an upgrade). This means all of my iPhone friends no longer can send SMS messages to me due to iMessage. My phone number is still connected to iMessage. I've tried disabling iMessage on all my macs, on my iPad and even inserting the SIM into my iPad and disabling it again. None of this fixes my problem.

This has caused some annoyances in my life where friends think I'm being a prick not responding to their SMSes, and the same with me and the people not responding to my SMSes.

I've removed my iPhone from my "Apple products" page, which solved some other persons problems. Didn't solve mine.

I've heard "insert your SIM into a friends' iPhone and disable iMessage". I kinda won't do that due to principles.

So, is there an official way of actually switching phone from an iPhone to another brand without messing up your social life? (It should be possible without turning off iMessage BEFORE selling your iPhone.)
 

ZeRoLiMiT

macrumors 6502a
Jun 6, 2010
845
89
Southern California
the person you sold your phone must have it on somehow and has your number on there. Only way to stop it is to call him/her and have them remove your number. OR!! like you said incert a sim and turn off imessages.
 

CatsTide

macrumors 6502
Sep 16, 2012
355
0
Make sure your friends have their settings set to"send as sms when iMessage is not available"
 

empezar

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 14, 2006
144
1
Is there seriously no way of disabling iMessage on a number without having access to an iPhone? Like an online iMessage administration? Is this some kind of sick joke? Nobody at Apple thought anyone would ever switch FROM iPhone to another phone? Jesus. The arrogance.
 

CatsTide

macrumors 6502
Sep 16, 2012
355
0
I'm not so sure that you phone is the problem. It may be that the other iphones are just still trying to send iMessages to you since that is the way they have been sent in the past. Did you check to see if they have their settings set the way I mentioned above?
 

Ledgem

macrumors 68020
Jan 18, 2008
2,034
924
Hawaii, USA
Make sure your friends have their settings set to"send as sms when iMessage is not available"
This won't solve his problem on its own. He has an iPad and a Mac, presumably running 10.8.2. If they're configured to use iMessage then the messages will get through, and his friends' phones will never try to send the message as a standard SMS because they'll receive delivery confirmation.

It becomes even trickier if empezar is set up to receive iMessages at an email address. If his friends' phones have sent and/or received iMessages from that address, they may revert to using that. His friends wouldn't know, unless they made separate contact entries for empezar's phone number and email address(es).

This is quite an interesting problem. I'd suggest disabling iMessage on your iPad and computer. If that doesn't fix it and if you're really that opposed to putting your SIM card into a friend's iPhone just to disable it, then I'd suggest heading to an Apple store and asking if they'll let you disable it from one of their phones. I don't know if they'll allow it, but it's worth a try. Or, you can try asking if there's a way that they can reset your iMessage status in the system.
 

CatsTide

macrumors 6502
Sep 16, 2012
355
0
This won't solve his problem on its own. He has an iPad and a Mac, presumably running 10.8.2. If they're configured to use iMessage then the messages will get through, and his friends' phones will never try to send the message as a standard SMS because they'll receive delivery confirmation.

It becomes even trickier if empezar is set up to receive iMessages at an email address. If his friends' phones have sent and/or received iMessages from that address, they may revert to using that. His friends wouldn't know, unless they made separate contact entries for empezar's phone number and email address(es).

This is quite an interesting problem. I'd suggest disabling iMessage on your iPad and computer. If that doesn't fix it and if you're really that opposed to putting your SIM card into a friend's iPhone just to disable it, then I'd suggest heading to an Apple store and asking if they'll let you disable it from one of their phones. I don't know if they'll allow it, but it's worth a try. Or, you can try asking if there's a way that they can reset your iMessage status in the system.

Good point and good stuff...I totally missed the part about his iPad and Macs.
 

Gav2k

macrumors G3
Jul 24, 2009
9,216
1,608
Just make sure your old number isn't associated with your mac/iPad
 

bslick

macrumors newbie
Apr 3, 2012
6
0
If the iPhone that you sold wasn't resetted then ask the person to go into settings > messages > send & receive and remove your phone number if its there. His number would probably be there as well checked. Or get him to reset the iPhone. Or you could try to get your friends to delete the iMessage convo history and create a new one to see if it sends as a text or iMessage.
 

RTWG

macrumors regular
Sep 12, 2008
145
109
How long ago did you use your iPhone? From my experience, iMessage will be automatically disabled on a device if it hasn't connected to the service for a specific period of time.

When my girlfriend went to Spain earlier this year, she didn't enable any roaming, so her phone was effectively offline for a week. Her phone showed up as an iMessage device for a couple of days, but then it reverted to text-message only until her return.
 

empezar

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 14, 2006
144
1
It's been two weeks now.

I have disabled iMessage on all my devices and removed all e-mails from the iMessage settings before totally disabling it. The iPhone was reset before I sold it.

It still doesn't work. Not sure there is an Apple Store in Sweden.
 

SomeDudeAsking

macrumors 65816
Nov 23, 2010
1,250
2
I haven't had any issues with it. In fact I think it's great being able to swap back and forth from my iPhone and MBP to continue conversations.

Yeah, until that thief that takes your iPhone and there is no way to stop them from getting your messages. Great. Your thief is now your eternal stalker.
 

SomeDudeAsking

macrumors 65816
Nov 23, 2010
1,250
2

Talk about a convoluted, painful, and "risky" process to sign out of Apple iMessages! #AppleFAIL. Think a grandma or a non-techie would know how to do all that? iMessages is the worst instant messaging service, you don't know if you are ever surely signed out. If you use something like Google Talk, at least Google tells you everywhere you are signed in and lets you revoke access. Plus, when you change your password with Google, you ACTUALLY get signed out everywhere until you log back in with the correct password.

Again #AppleFAIL.
 

T5BRICK

macrumors G3
Aug 3, 2006
8,313
2,387
Oregon
Talk about a convoluted, painful, and "risky" process to sign out of Apple iMessages! #AppleFAIL. Think a grandma or a non-techie would know how to do all that? iMessages is the worst instant messaging service, you don't know if you are ever surely signed out. If you use something like Google Talk, at least Google tells you everywhere you are signed in and lets you revoke access. Plus, when you change your password with Google, you ACTUALLY get signed out everywhere until you log back in with the correct password.

Again #AppleFAIL.

I was simply pointing out that your claim that you couldn't stop a potential thief from gaining access to your iMessages was incorrect.

If you don't like the service, don't use it.
 

empezar

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 14, 2006
144
1
Contact Apple via email. They're usually very quick.

Could someone please tell me their e-mail? I couldn't find it by their website. Great website, Apple. Even Google couldn't find it.
 

SomeDudeAsking

macrumors 65816
Nov 23, 2010
1,250
2
I was simply pointing out that your claim that you couldn't stop a potential thief from gaining access to your iMessages was incorrect.

If you don't like the service, don't use it.

I don't use iMessage.

And if you actually read the article that you linked to, you would have saw that part of the steps they tell you to do is to WIPE your iPhone AND THEN deactivate the SIM from your carrier. Well, that isn't possible if you don't have Find My iPhone enabled and it also won't work for the original poster of this thread because the person that bought his iPhone would be using his own accounts now. So the person that bought the iPhone will be receiving all the poster's iMessages unless you are actually able to reach a techie that has access to the iMessage servers to forcefully wipe your logins.

So there. HA! #AppleFAIL
 

empezar

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 14, 2006
144
1
Again, I did wipe the phone before selling it.

iMessages are still delivered to my phone number, and since my Android can't receive them, they are lost in the cloud. I guess most my friends haven't checked the "send SMS if iMessages #fail".
 

T5BRICK

macrumors G3
Aug 3, 2006
8,313
2,387
Oregon
I don't use iMessage.

And if you actually read the article that you linked to, you would have saw that part of the steps they tell you to do is to WIPE your iPhone AND THEN deactivate the SIM from your carrier. Well, that isn't possible if you don't have Find My iPhone enabled and it also won't work for the original poster of this thread because the person that bought his iPhone would be using his own accounts now. So the person that bought the iPhone will be receiving all the poster's iMessages unless you are actually able to reach a techie that has access to the iMessage servers to forcefully wipe your logins.

So there. HA! #AppleFAIL

I did read the article. It sounds like if you don't have Find My iPhone enabled, #youFAIL.

----------

Again, I did wipe the phone before selling it.

iMessages are still delivered to my phone number, and since my Android can't receive them, they are lost in the cloud. I guess most my friends haven't checked the "send SMS if iMessages #fail".

Apple actually advises turning iMessage off before you get rid of the phone to avoid this. Although, I will admit they should make this more prominent than the support page you'd probably only find after it was too late.

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2755
 
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