iOS 18: Apple brings RCS to the iPhone

Apple has confirmed that the upcoming operating system iOS 18 will bring the SMS successor RCS (Rich Communication Services) to the iPhone. According to feedback from beta testers of the developer preview, the feature has now been integrated in Germany as well. Beta 3 has been available for a few days now, allowing RCS to be activated in the system settings. However, to find the feature, you have to search a bit: It is located under „Apps“ and then „Messages“. Developers had previously reported that RCS was active in other countries. In Germany, RCS will at least be available for users of the Telekom network, but other mobile network providers could also be included, as Apple seems to be introducing the feature on a country-specific basis. To activate RCS support, there is a single switch in the settings under the menu item „Text Messages“. Currently, the description text in this area is only available in English. The meaning of the sentence is: Communication with RCS is done via mobile data. There is a possibility that network identifiers will be shared with your mobile network provider and its partners. Apple also intends to enable the use of so-called business chats, similar to those already available in iMessage. However, these will not be sent via the Apple service, but instead through the SMS successor. This feature is called „RCS messages from businesses“. Apple explains that this is also controlled by the mobile network provider: Your network operator will send, receive and verify your RCS messages from businesses. However, it remains to be seen exactly how this will work in practice. Similar to SMS, RCS messages are visually distinguished in the Messages app: Instead of the blue color for iMessage messages, RCS messages appear in green (green bubbles). With this new service for Apple users, modern messaging features such as voice messages, read receipts, typing indicators, Wi-Fi data transfer (as an alternative to mobile data), as well as higher resolutions for photos and videos are supported. There is also the option of group messaging. In contrast to iMessage, end-to-end encryption is not planned. However, it can be assumed that providers like Google will at least provide transport encryption using TLS to ensure that communication from the smartphone to the RCS server cannot be intercepted. It can be expected that Apple will handle this in the same way. For a long time, Google has been pushing for Apple to support RCS. This also targeted the feelings of the users: Some even consider the representation of communication from Android devices in green to be bullying. It remains to be seen how much the usage of RCS will increase now with Apple’s direct support in iOS 18. For iPhone owners, this simply represents an additional channel of communication.

Schlagwörter: Apple + RCS + Deutschland

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