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Has Apple said how long they keep sent iMessages?

rockinrocker

rockinrocker

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Aug 21, 2006
1,323
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It's not really a big deal, just curious more than anything else.

But do these just sit on a server some place forever? Have they said anything about how long they keep the info in/about the messages we send?

What about other notifications?
 
rockinrocker said:
It's not really a big deal, just curious more than anything else.

But do these just sit on a server some place forever? Have they said anything about how long they keep the info in/about the messages we send?

What about other notifications?
Click to expand...

They haven't disclosed that information but I'm guessing they keep it for a very long time. How else would they be able to tell us how many iMessages have been sent since it launched?
 
brylliant said:
They haven't disclosed that information but I'm guessing they keep it for a very long time. How else would they be able to tell us how many iMessages have been sent since it launched?
Click to expand...

Ummm... they note how many have been sent. Delete. Don't reset the count... You're right though, Apple's software engineers probably are not capable of writing such a daunting code.

As far as how long they keep them, who knows. Seems like a pointless waste of infrastructure for Apple to hold on to them for a significant amount of time.
 
afurry13 said:
As far as how long they keep them, who knows. Seems like a pointless waste of infrastructure for Apple to hold on to them for a significant amount of time.
Click to expand...

I agree that it would be pointless (which doesn't, of course, mean they're not doing it), but can't imagine that even millions of ~100 character messages would really take up too big of a chunk of their data servers.
 
There are other security implications with all forms of electronic communication, texts, iMessages etc. are retained by Apple on behalf of security organisations if flagged by them. Joe public need have no worries though, as posted above, it would require a lot of server capacity to keep every single message for any length of time
 
When you sync your iDevice (Which has iMessage) do your messages get synced too? I should remember this as I restored my iPhone a few weeks ago, but I think it doesn't.
 
It seems to be indefinitely, I have been able to pull up messages from last year. I'd have to check, but I think it may go all the way back to the iOS 5 beta when iMessage was first implemented.


rockinrocker said:
I agree that it would be pointless (which doesn't, of course, mean they're not doing it), but can't imagine that even millions of ~100 character messages would really take up too big of a chunk of their data servers.
Click to expand...
They store any images/videos you send as well.
 
Beta Particle said:
It seems to be indefinitely, I have been able to pull up messages from last year. I'd have to check, but I think it may go all the way back to the iOS 5 beta when iMessage was first implemented.


They store any images/videos you send as well.
Click to expand...

Do you mean you pulled them from the server or locally from your iDevice or backup?
 
rockinrocker said:
Do you mean you pulled them from the server or locally from your iDevice or backup?
Click to expand...
When I signed into iMessage on a MacBook Pro for the first time (Lion iMessage beta) it started downloading everything on my account from the beginning, attachments and all.

These were conversations that had been "deleted" on my iPad.
 
Beta Particle said:
When I signed into iMessage on a MacBook Pro for the first time (Lion iMessage beta) it started downloading everything on my account from the beginning, attachments and all.

These were conversations that had been "deleted" on my iPad.
Click to expand...

Well I guess we have our answer then, eh? Apparently they're all saved in perpetuity.
 
Beta Particle said:
When I signed into iMessage on a MacBook Pro for the first time (Lion iMessage beta) it started downloading everything on my account from the beginning, attachments and all.

These were conversations that had been "deleted" on my iPad.
Click to expand...

mine didn't do that at all.
 
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