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Google turns to regulators to make Apple open up iMessage

2023-11-08 17:03 by
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Search giant Google and other major European telecom operators including Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom, Telefonica and Orange have written a letter to the European Commission to regulate Apple iMessage as a 'core' platform service under the new Digital Markets Act (DMA), reported Financial Times.

iMessage serves as "an important gateway between business users and their customers" and should be regulated as a "core" service under the EU's new Digital Markets Act (DMA), said Google and a group of major European telcos in a letter sent to the European Commission, and seen by The Financial Times. Being designated as a "core platform service" would be significant for iMessage, as it could compel Apple to make it interoperable with other messaging services.

Apple's Messages app can already send cross-platform messages via SMS. But iMessage's enhanced features like encryption and better quality photos and videos, is exclusive to Apple's ecosystem. Apple iMessage users communicate with feature-rich blue bubbles, while everyone else is relegated to a lowly green.

Google has been very vocal about its desire for Apple to adopt RCS, the cross-platform messaging standard pitched as the successor to SMS, with its #GetTheMessage campaign.

"Apple's iMessage lock-in is a documented strategy," Google senior vice-president Hiroshi Lockheimer posted on X, then known as Twitter, last year. "Using peer pressure and bullying as a way to sell products is disingenuous for a company that has humanity and equity as a core part of its marketing. The standards exist today to fix this."

The Commission's investigation into whether iMessage should be designated a core platform service under the DMA is ongoing. A decision is expected before February next year.

Read more -here-

 

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