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BlackBerry Takes Advantage of iMessage Spam Reports to Tout BBM

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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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BlackBerry is taking advantage of reports of iMessage's vulnerability to spam messages to tout its BlackBerry Messenger app. In a blog post, the company highlights a report from earlier this week that said iMessage users see quite a bit of spam, with accounts run by spammers responsible for more than 30 percent of all spam messages on mobile devices.

BlackBerry suggests that iMessage users switch to BBM to avoid spam and lists five reasons why BBM is superior to iMessage. According to the company, BBM is safer primarily because it does not utilize a phone number or email address and it only accepts messages from contacts.

bbm_ios.jpg
1) BBM is architected in a way that protects our 85 million users against spammers. iMessage works off of phone number or Apple ID. Anyone who has your number or Apple ID can send you messages whether you want them to or not. With BBM, users have a lot more control due to our "invite and accept" paradigm. In other words, both parties need to be mutually committed to being contacts in order to send and receive messages.

2) BBM gives you control. There's no spam on BBM due to its self-policing system. Users are in control of their contact list and there is no way to send a message without being contacts. You can't control someone showing up to your house, but you don't have to open the door. With BBM someone can request to be added to your list, but you don't have to accept their invite.
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BlackBerry also uses its list to highlight BBM's encryption that protects messages from "spying or hacking," its ability to block contacts, and its cross-platform availability.

Despite all of BBM's apparent perks, BlackBerry has had trouble convincing users to adopt the app due to competition from iMessage and other messaging apps like WhatsApp, Kik, WeChat, and more. In late 2013, BlackBerry users on Android, iPhone, and BlackBerry phones sent and received approximately 10 billion messages per day, while WhatsApp processed upwards 50 billion messages per day.

Listed as number 56 in the social networking section of the App Store, BBM is ranked far below competing messaging apps. BlackBerry itself has also been struggling in recent months as iOS and Android make gains in the enterprise market.

The initial report on iMessage spam pointed towards Apple's deep integration of mobile and desktop as the reason for iMessage's popularity with scammers. While the uptick in iMessage spam has been recent, Apple does have some measures in place to combat spammers. There's rate-limiting on the iMessage network to stop users from sending hundreds of messages and there is a spam reporting protocol in place, but Apple will likely need adopt more aggressive measures in the future to limit spam messages due to the platform's growing popularity with spammers.

Article Link: BlackBerry Takes Advantage of iMessage Spam Reports to Tout BBM
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2014/08/22/blackberry-touts-bbm-imessage-spam/
newyorksole

newyorksole

macrumors 603
Apr 2, 2008
5,086
6,381
New York.
Is it just me orrr can a couple of those bullet points be merged together ...

Edit: iMessage came out with iOS 5 right ? Haven't had ANY Spam .
 
R

rgeneral

macrumors 6502
Dec 2, 2012
399
1,479
Z400Racer37 said:
I've actually never gotten spam, and I've had my iPhone for over 3 years now...
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i have been using for almost 4 years now. i have never gotten a spam message on any apple device. the spam message i get is not iMessage. it is just SMS text.
 
sputnikv

sputnikv

macrumors 6502a
Oct 3, 2009
507
3,187
This can be easily rectified in iMessage by providing a setting to only receive messages from contacts and from those approved
 
Dilster3k

Dilster3k

macrumors 6502a
Jul 20, 2014
790
3,206
Last resorts of a dying company. Mediocre hardware, pathetic & ugly new operating system. I don't care if they have better security, I can't wait till enterprise ditches them completely. This is what happens when you can't properly adapt with our ever-evolving technology.
 
Eweie

Eweie

macrumors regular
Oct 5, 2013
152
84
LOL who even uses blackberry? nice try but no one going to buy your crappy phone just because a few people get spam sometimes.
 
B

braintumor

macrumors regular
Mar 23, 2010
226
216
Thats how deep Blackberry has fallen, going from a major phone company with its own mobile plattform (that corporations loved), to now only being a messenger app! (Not even an important messenger compared to whatsapp, facebook etc)

In 5-10 years we will only hear about blackberry in museums, i hope the owners of the company realize that too and soon try to sell the company to get some $$$ out of it before it disappears completely.
 
G

grjj

macrumors 6502
Apr 5, 2014
269
530
Bbm

Do I understand correctly that if I put my mobile number on my business card that no-one can send me a message on BBM on that number? They first have to email me their contact card then we can text?
 
PocketSand11

PocketSand11

macrumors 6502a
Jun 12, 2014
688
1
~/
"BBM is safer primarily because it does not utilize a phone number or email address and it only accepts messages from contacts."

First of all, that's not good. People would try to message me for the first time and get blocked. Secondly, "safer"? Spam on iMessage is just mildly annoying and wastes about 1 second of my life each year. It's always some ad for knockoff shoes. They wouldn't waste effort spamming BBM anyway because nobody uses it.
 
Z

Z400Racer37

macrumors 6502a
Feb 7, 2011
711
1,664
... Although I have to admit, this was pretty hilarious lolol
 

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heisenberg123

heisenberg123

macrumors 603
Oct 31, 2010
6,496
9
Hamilton, Ontario
the biggest hiccup with iMessage is it has been known to locked your phone number into iMessage so if you change to a Android or BB and you send an SMS to a friend still on iPhone it thinks your sending an iMessage which actually never sends anything
 
dannyyankou

dannyyankou

macrumors G5
Mar 2, 2012
13,000
27,984
Westchester, NY
Spammers don't target BBM because of the small number of users. Same reason Macs don't get malware that often.

And I've never had spam on iMessage either.
 
jclo

jclo

Managing Editor
Staff member
Dec 7, 2012
1,970
4,302
I've gotten a total of four spam messages, but two were in 2013 and two were in 2012. Haven't had one since then.
 
tlevier

tlevier

macrumors regular
Jun 7, 2010
134
2
Littleton, CO
grjj said:
Do I understand correctly that if I put my mobile number on my business card that no-one can send me a message on BBM on that number? They first have to email me their contact card then we can text?
Click to expand...

Sounds about right based on the post.

I know in the US it's less of a problem than maybe China. I've only received 2-3 spam messages, and those were in the last 2 months and seem to have stopped. Here's an idea for those who have trouble with spammers:

1) I like to leave "read receipts" on. If this is you, never open the message, just delete it from your list unread.

2) If you have a consistent problem, turn iMessage off for a few days. (iphone only). If you've got an iPad and Mac set up, not sure how to handle that... but the idea is to force back to the sender an "undeliverable" "unresolvable" problem so they remove you from their efforts.
 
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