‘Not Available For All’—Apple Changes iPhone Messaging This Week
‘Not Available For All’—Apple Changes iPhone Messaging This Week
Publish Date: 2026-05-12 03:00:00
Source Domain: www.forbes.com
All change for iMessage.
NurPhoto via Getty Images
Updated on May 12 as Apple’s new messaging update goes live.
It’s finally here. Almost 18-months after the FBI warned Americans to stop texting between iPhone and Android, Apple has fixed the problem. This week, iOS 26.5 finally brings encrypted cross-platform messaging for the first time.
But Apple warns this “is not available to all.”
That availability affects devices — suggesting not all iPhones will be capable of sending fully secure RCS messages — and also carriers, which affects even iPhones with the upgrade. And it’s this second type of availability that’s the bigger issue.
When you send a WhatsApp message it is always end-to-end encrypted. That’s because WhatsApp controls all “ends” of the chat. The clients (apps) ensure that every message is secure. That encryption can never fall away.
It’s the same when you send an iMessage to other Apple users — the infamous blue bubbles. Every iMessage is fully encrypted. It can’t send messages any other way. If one “end” of the chat is not using iMessage on an Apple device, the bubble is green and it’s clearly noted that this is a text or RCS message.
With Google Messages it’s more complex. If all “ends” are using an updated version of Google Messages, then RCS messages are fully encrypted. But it’s not as clear when that encryption is not running. Users need to check.
That’s even more acute with the new upgrade. Apple’s and Google’s deployment of fully encrypted RCS relies on carriers not apps. The encryption is baked into the protocol, not applied by the iMessage or Google Messages envelope. An RCS chat between an Android and iPhone user could change from end-to-end encrypted to not, depending on which networks the phones are connected to at the time.
In its release notes ahead of the new version of iOS going live, Apple confirmed that “end-to-end…
