Interesting. It’s like companies that force people to use their apps because it improves their ability to track users.
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iPhone-Android RCS Conversations Are End-to-End Encrypted in iOS 26.5
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BSDnostalgia
macrumors 6502a
I must lead a sheltered life, because, of the O(1000) people I have ever messaged with, the hundreds in my address book, and the scores I message with at least occasionally, no one has ever even asked me about using WhatsApp. People use a mixture of iMessage and SMS, with Android users who care about privacy using Signal. I expect a few more messages to go via RCS instead of SMS in the future. I literally don't understand why anybody would use WhatsApp.
You’re absolutely right. Being Google, they can and will find a way to cancel anything.
Of course Apple tracks its users. Every company tracks users that have paid for services from them. It’s the only way for them to actually provide those services. Creating a username/password is telling that service, “This is who I am, and when I come back, I want you to remember me. There are features of your service that you provide when I give you this way to track me that’s worth being tracked by you.” It only becomes a problem with a company that a user has NOT entered into an agreement with is tracking them. That’s Third-Party tracking.
Safari’s been pretty effective at throwing a wrench into third party ad networks ability to monetize Safari browser users. As a result, some companies that REALLY want that third party ad networks revenue are forcing users to use their apps. Because those apps tell the users what they’re going to track when they download them (in the App Store description), they end up having access to FAR more data than what they get from a user using Safari.
BSDnostalgia
macrumors 6502a
BSDnostalgia
macrumors 6502a
Apple countered that somewhat by giving users back some control over what those apps could do with its privacy control. And, some of those companies cried bloody murder about it.
The problem here is that some of us value our privacy to at least some extent, while others think that is not an issue (for us, not them). e.g.:
"You already have zero privacy - get over it."
Yes exactly. However, - if you would live in Europe where Meta has a big market share in regard to messaging then it is unfortunately a typical expectation to have WhatsApp installed. People which don't have it installed are quite often considered as "strange folks" (while it should be the other way around). 😉
However, - thanks to RCS there exist for me an useful alternative on Android. The people are usually just not aware of that possibility. They are then really surprised that it is possible the send photos in the original resolution (!) directly to a mobile phone number, - without any additionally application.
Whatever, - regarding Switzerland the Telcos seems to have accepted their fate. It looks that some RCS support will be re-introduced between the summer and the end of 2026 (source). I didn't know about that until now. Perhaps the standardization of the E2EE encryption in the RCS Universal Profile 3.0 last year (2025) had some impact.
So finally it really looks that RCS will be available in the Swiss at the end of 2026 also for iPhone users, - great.
An app for sending messages is natively available on every phone regardless of the OS.
Try searching for "Messages".
Others reading both will understand the difference.
Could you quote the part mentioning it? I could not read beyond the following.
"Wenn Swisscom, Salt und Sunrise mitspielen, entsteht eine Alternative zu Whatsapp, Threema und Signal."
The article seems to be now behind a paywall. It was written at the end of that article that the re-introduction of RCS can be expected in late 2026. The only other source can be found at the Swisscom community support forum, - here. A Swisscom customer (which most likely uses an iPhone) has written an email directly to the CEO of Swisscom and he received the following answer (translated form German):
"RCS is in Switzerland currently offered exclusively via the Google [Jibe] backend and can be used on Android devices with the 'Messages' app. Apple has activated RCS in select countries with iOS 18; however, further rollouts require additional technical integrations and legal clarifications on the part of the network operators.
Swisscom is in contact with Google and Apple regarding this and is working to create the necessary conditions. Our goal is to offer our customers a flawless and modern RCS service as soon as possible. We are working at full speed to launch the service by the end of 2026. However, we cannot yet provide a specific date for its introduction on Apple devices."