Why google struggles so much to replace the SMS with the RCS ? And why can Apple help him 

Google has supported RCS for several years already, but the messaging protocol will now replace SMS and MMS with features worthy of instant messaging applications like Whatsapp or Facebook Messenger. Now, the Google messages app Active the default RCS For all users.

What is RCS messaging for Android phones?

RCS is the acronym for Rich Communication Services, a standard international communications industry protocol which aims to develop SMS/MMS messages on Android phones. Inspired by Instant Popular Messaging Applications, RCS works through the native messaging application on your phone. It offers you a simplicity of use and multimedia wealth, with many chat features that were not proposed with traditional text messaging.

Functionalities offered

• Private and group conversations
• Message reception and reading notice
• Sharing files, photos and videos in high resolution
• Sharing audio and video messages
• Share of location

Chat features are possible only via the Internet (mobile data or Wi-Fi). Make sure you have a data package or Wi-Fi connection to avoid additional costs.

Why google struggles so much to replace the SMS with the RCS ? And why can Apple help him ?

Available on Android smartphones since June 2019, the RCS protocol allows you to exchange larger files and know when someone writes or has read a message, as in a encrypted messaging application. Only problem, to become the norm, it lacks Apple’s support.

Android has always suffered from a fragmentation problem. Since manufacturers and operators can modify the operating system as they please, Google has never really managed to make its services essential for all users.
The most blatant example is that of messaging where, facing Apple and its iMessage, Google gives the impression of being stuck on a boat in the middle of the ocean. The company has launched many different software, has hoped to make reference applications, but still struggles to compete against Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger, Telegram, Signal, Wechat, Snapchat, Instagram or even in front of the good old SMS, which don’t want to go. There is no universal messaging application on Android, to the greatest misfortune of its creator.

A standard for a universal base ?

Aware that it is too late to make up for WhatsApp or Messenger, Google changed strategy a few years ago. The web giant now wishes to kill the good old SMS, obsolete and not very secure, by replacing it with a standard named RCS, for Rich Communication Services, integrated under the name of cat features in its universe.
A standard of which he is not the father but rather a faithful defender. The RCS was indeed in development from 2007, to be finalized until 2016 by the GSMA, whose lack of motivation is perplexed. It was not until 2018 that Google seized it with conviction and begins to make the voice of it.

Distributed in IP, and therefore independent of 2G/3G switched networks, and even the SMSOIP protocol of 4G and 5G, which is perfect for the weight of view of a net giant, RCS messages may contain much more ‘Information that SMS/MMS. They allow you to exchange images in high resolution, videos and indicators such as the time of reading a message or, as on iMessage, the fact that your correspondent is writing.
The RCS has also been designed to operate in a group, like any other messaging application. Its main advantage, under Android, is that you need nothing to install, since Android messages is there, and compatible.
To ensure that your messages are properly distributed your messages are properly distributed, “Google uses information such as your phone number, device identifiers and SIM card number”. But everything is transparent for you, and this data is only kept temporarily.
Another fundamental point, all the conversations are encrypted from start to finish, via TLS technology, for transport Layer Security.

However, despite the undeniable contribution of this protocol, despite the weight of Google, two years after its deployment in the application Android messages, RCS is still not the norm. How to explain this slowness ?

Too many partners to convince

As we said in the introduction, Google’s difficulties are due to the fragmentation of Android. Initially, Google had asked operators to set up their own RCS servers. The company quickly realized that its partners did not intend to play the game and decided to become the intermediary by which your messages pass through.
Only problem, its servers can only work with Android messages, Its own messaging application installed normally on all Android smartphones.

The problem is in “normally”. In particular in the United States, operators preinstall their own SMS applications on smartphones they sell. The user can install Android messages And to configure it by default but, in all objectivity, imagine you really an 80 year old grandmother change her SMS client by default to benefit from RCS ?
Another problem, this world world, most manufacturers have long used their own messaging applications, just to sell services next to it. Samsung, Oppo, OnePlus, Xiaomi, Huawei … all do it. Android messages has never been the default application on smartphones for the biggest manufacturers, reducing Google’s efforts in nothingness. In other words, even by deploying the RCS itself, Google only touched a minority of the owners of an Android mobile.

The “forcing” method

But times change. Since 2020, Google has been trying to impose its application Android messages… With strangely a lot of success. All Chinese manufacturers have given up their homemade messaging application and now use the default Google application. To succeed in this feat, Android’s dad simply revised the terms of his contract when using his services.
Oppo, Xiaomi and OnePlus were somehow forced, which is ultimately good news for the owners of these smartphones. Smart, Google also took the opportunity to ask them to highlight its other software like Duo Or Assistant, now displayed on the home page.

Another thorn in Google’s foot, operators. In France, where most mobiles are purchased without commitment, we are spared by this problem (the RCS has been deployed with all operators since June 2019). Elsewhere, especially in the United States, reality is quite different. The good news is that Google has just succeeded in convincing Verizon, the last of the three large American operators, to follow it.
As early as 2022, the operator will give up its SMS application, such as AT&T and T-Mobile before him, which will allow owners of Android smartphones in the United States to exchange between them without sms. We imagine that Google took out the checkbook.

Google’s latest problem is Samsung, but the two companies have almost found common ground. The latest smartphones of the Korean brand also haveAndroid messages But, strangely, Samsung messages is always the software chosen by default. Given the rapprochement between the two companies, it is likely that Google will end up convincing Samsung. Without the biggest smartphone seller in the world, the RCS cannot become the norm.

Apple has the future of the RCS in its hands

Let’s come to Apple. With Imessage, Tim Cook’s company does not suffer from the same problems as its neighbor. To tell the truth, she succeeded wherever Google failed. All users of an iPhone use the same application, go through its secure platform and, above all, are so satisfied that they do not want to leave. Imessage is a spectacular success due to its transparent integration into the Apple ecosystem.

Unfortunately for Google, the RCS has no chance of completely eliminating the SMS without the help of Apple. With 26% market share in June 2021 (according to Statcounter), iOS occupies an far too large place in the smartphone market to be left out.
However, Google does not want RCS to be the messaging standard between Android smartphones, but the email standard. So he must convince Apple, which is not necessarily known for its great listening capacity.

“In the future, the default messaging experience on Android will be the most secure. The email experience on the other platform will not be encrypted, since it is always SMS. I think this is an interesting dynamic and I hope that, as everyone focuses on security and confidentiality, this will become an important element in the discussion. »» declares Hiroshi Lockheimer, the boss of Android, to The Verge.

With this kind of declaration, Google plays the card of provocation with Apple. iOS being deemed to be a platform respectful of the privacy of its users, the impossibility of interacting with the owner of an Android smartphone other than by SMS is necessarily a thorn in his foot.
Google, who said they did not wish to launch its own RCS customer on iOS, wants to push Apple to adopt the standard in the future. Today, nothing suggests that Apple will follow. The menu of privacy may be in its principles, the RCS could harm Imessage. Even if it is technically possible that RCS and Imessage coexist, one would be used when the iPhone communicates with an Android smartphone, the other when Apple smartphones exchange between them. Apple can consider that only the conversations between iPhone owners deserve to be protected ?

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It’s hard to consider. Because it would amount to saying that Apple tolerates that a significant part of the conversations of its users, those maintained with Android users, are not. However, Apple likes to point the finger at weaknesses in its neighbors, but in this case, it would be the cause of this weakness ..
And then, recently, the frontime opening for Android users (and Windows) shows that Apple is not reclusive, in any case not when it comes to offering a better experience to its users.

Anyway, even in the event that Apple and Samsung fully adopt the RCS, the SMS should survive for a long time. Even if most users will change in spite of themselves to the new standard, some owners of old mobiles will continue to go through SMS (especially since alternative messaging applications will continue to be offered on the Play Store, without RCS).
In other markets, such as China, Android messages is not for example at all present. There, even if local applications like WeChat dominate, the SMS should still remain powerful.
In short, even as a legitimate SMS heir, the RCS is still far from being able to kill its ancestor. He should nevertheless succeed in his bet and become the majority, but in how long ?

Google activates RCS in its messages: what advantages for Android users ?

Google Application Application Now Active RCS messages by default. The protocol always shunned by Apple with iOS therefore replaces SMS for all users of the Google messaging application.

RCS (Rich Communication Services) East A messaging protocol that aims to replace SMS by richer and interactive messages. It allows you to take advantage of features such as reading confirmation, file sharing, video calls, or geolocation.

Google has supported RCS for several years already, but the messaging protocol will now replace SMS and MMS with features worthy of instant messaging applications like Whatsapp or Facebook Messenger. Now, the Google messages app Active the default RCS For all users.

Since last year, Google has put pressure on Apple to encourage it to adopt the RCS. The Cupertino firm actually sheds the RCS on iOS. That is to say that RCS messages sent by an Android device are always converted to SMS/MMS on iPhone. In any case, the use of the RCS standard is democratized on Android.

Google’s messages application goes to RCS: here are the new features that will replace the SMS

A Google community manager announced the good news on the group’s forums. She confirmed that the RCS is now Activated by default in the messages application For all users, new as well as old.

Moreover, ” All your RCS conversations in By Google messages are encrypted from start to finish »». This therefore guarantees security and confidentiality of your personal data. Concretely, this means that all messages sent via RCS are only visible by the sender and the recipient. Neither Google nor the mobile operator have access to it.

What differences between RCS and SMS ?

Compared to SMS, the RCS protocol unlocks new features such as:

• See when the interlocutor is writing a message
• Share photos, videos and high resolution files
• Know when the recipient has read or received the message
• Participate in group conversations
• Share geolocation
• Launch video calls and calls in VoIP

You should know that Google’s messaging application sends messages using the RCS protocol via Wi-Fi and mobile data. Of course, this applies only if all the participants in a conversation have the RCS standard.

You can obviously deactivate the RCS if you are not interested in the features. In this case, press your profile icon in the messages app, then open the messages settings. Press “RCS cats” and you will have the option activate or deactivate RCS messages.