Tag: beeper mini

Beeper Takes Down Beeper Mini App From Google Play Store After iMessage Saga: Report

Beeper Mini has been involved in a long-running saga of promising to facilitate iMessage to Android users, getting blocked by Apple, and finding repeated workarounds to make the service work. The messaging platform seems to be running out of options now, as the Beeper Mini app has reportedly been removed from Google Play Store. The latest development follows an announcement from the Beeper team last month that said the app had received its final update, pretty much giving up the fight to make iMessages reliably work on Android phones.

According to a report from 9to5Google, the standalone Beeper Mini app, which enables blue bubbles iMessage texting on Android phones, has been removed from the Play Store. The Beeper team announced the decision officially Thursday via a message to Beeper Cloud users.

The iMessage feature from Beeper Mini has also been moved to the ‘Labs’ section in the Beeper Cloud app. “We have moved iMessage to ‘Labs’ in Beeper Cloud and removed Beeper Mini from the Play Store,” the message to Beeper Cloud users reportedly said. While the Beeper Mini app is no longer available to download from Google’s storefront, it can still be sideloaded via the apk file available on the Beeper website. Beeper Cloud is still available on the Play Store.

Additionally, Eric Migicovsky, the cofounder of Beeper also provided further update on the company’s roadmap in the announcement message. According to the report, the company is working to add 14 other chat networks to the Beeper Mini Android app, which it calls its number 1 priority. “It’s a completely new app, with a new design, built for top speed and performance,” the message reportedly added. The company also said that improvements to the Beeper desktop app are on the way, including a performance boost.

Last month, Beeper announced a final update for the Mini app on its blog. After multiple workarounds and fixes to get iMessage working stably on Android phones, the company admitted that its efforts were “unsustainable” in the long term. The company said it was no longer going to issue fixes for its app if Apple were to disrupt the service. “As much as we want to fight for what we believe is a fantastic product that really should exist, the truth is that we can’t win a cat-and-mouse game with the largest company on earth,” the Beeper team said.

Apple, which has constantly blocked Beeper’s efforts to run iMessage on Android phones, has claimed that the Beeper Mini app poses “significant risks to user security and privacy.” The Beeper team, however, denies that claim, accusing Apple instead of monopolising the iMessage service to sell more iPhone.

Earlier in December 2023, Beeper Mini, after launching, getting blocked by Apple, and finding a workaround, announced that its new fix to run iMessage on Android phones would require Beeper users to access a Mac for registration.

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Beeper Says Its Efforts to Bring iMessage to Android Is ‘Unsustainable’ After Providing Jailbroken iPhone Fix

Beeper, the messaging platform that has fought hard to bring Apple’s iMessage to Android phones, seems to have released a final update for its service. After multiple attempts at making iMessage work on Android devices reliably, with workarounds that involved users accessing a Mac, Beeper has said its efforts to bring the popular messaging service on Android are “unsustainable.” The company announced its future plans hours after it said it had found a stable solution for iMessages to work on Android for Beeper Mini and Cloud users.

It its blog post published late Thursday, Beeper said it did not have any plans to revive its efforts if its latest iMessage fix was thwarted by Apple. “Each time that Beeper Mini goes ‘down’ or is made to be unreliable due to interference by Apple, Beeper’s credibility takes a hit,” the company said in its blog. “It’s unsustainable. As much as we want to fight for what we believe is a fantastic product that really should exist, the truth is that we can’t win a cat-and-mouse game with the largest company on earth.”

Beeper said that it expected Apple to tolerate its latest software release and that the iMessage connection software behind Beeper Mini and Beeper Cloud was being made open source. “Anyone who wants can use it or continue development,” Beeper said. The company will now focus on its long-term goal of building “the best chat app on Earth.”

In the blog, Beeper also responded to Apple’s claims that its app posed “significant risks to user security and privacy.” In its detailed rebuttal, the company said that Beeper Mini was not a malicious app and was secure, contrary to claims made by the iPhone maker.

Beeper’s latest update came soon after the company said that phone number registration on the Beeper Mini app was back, which would allow Android phone numbers to show up in blue colour in iMessage. Beeper users, however, would need to access an old jailbroken iPhone, a Mac computer, or find a friend with a Mac.

Beeper left detailed instructions to get iMessage working reliably on Android in a separate blog post announcing the jailbroken iPhone fix for phone number registration. For Beeper Mini users on mobile devices, an old jailbroken iPhone (6/6s/SE1/7/8/X) would do the trick.

Earlier this week, Beeper released an iMessage fix on Android devices that would require users to access a Mac computer for the service to work reliably. A Mac registration would allow Android users to send blue bubble text messages on iMessage. Users must have continued access to a Mac computer, however, for the messaging service to work.

While Beeper has been working on various fixes and workarounds to get iMessage to work on Android devices, Apple has continued to block the service citing privacy and security concerns. In a statement to The Verge, Apple said that the company had taken steps to block Beeper Mini’s access to iMessage as it exploited “fake credentials.” The company said that it took steps to protect its users as Beeper’s techniques “posed significant risks to user security and privacy.”

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Beeper Mini Now Requires Users to Access a Mac to Send Blue Bubble iMessage Texts From Android

Beeper Mini has had a busy two weeks. The messaging app first introduced iMessage support on Android phones without the need for an Apple ID earlier this month. Then, Apple sprang into action and blocked the company’s iMessage service citing security concerns. Beeper scrambled to get iMessages working on Android, eventually resuming service with some restrictions. The Apple ID requirement, for once, was back. Now, the messaging app has provided another update on its iMessage service. Beeper now requires Android phone users to have access to a Mac for the service to work reliably.

In a reddit post Tuesday, the Beeper team provided a status update for an iMessages fix on Android devices. “We’ve found a solution to stabilize the iMessage situation for Beeper Cloud and Mini,” the company said in the post. The solution is that Android users must have access to a Mac computer for iMessages to work with blue text bubbles on an Android phone.

“When you connect iMessage on Beeper, we need to send identification information called ‘registration data’ from a real Mac,” the Beeper team explained in the post. “We have, up until now, we been using our own fleet of Mac servers to provide this. Unfortunately, this has proven to be an easy target for Apple because thousands of Beeper users were using the same registration data.”

Beeper Mini announced that it will publish an update for Beeper Cloud (Mac version) on Wednesday that would generate unique registration data for each user. “This 1:1 mapping of registration data to individual user—in our testing—makes the connection very reliable,” the post said. It’s also worth noting that the Mac registration isn’t a one-time thing; Beeper users would need to have continued access to a Mac for iMessage to work. Beeper Mini needs to regenerate Mac registration data once every week or every month even after initial connection, in which case a Mac computer must be switched on regularly.

The company also mentioned that users without a Mac could ask a friend on Beeper with a Mac for their registration data. According to Beeper, their testing showed that up to 20 iMessage users could safely use the same registration data.

While Beeper’s latest update enables stable iMessages with Apple ID for Android users, it certainly presents hurdles by requiring continued access to a Mac computer.

Released December 5, Beeper Mini promised iMessage service to Android users without requiring an Apple ID. The standalone Android app connects directly to Apple’s servers, allowing users to send messages that appear as blue bubbles to iMessage users — as if sent from an iPhone. The messaging app also supports features like read receipts, typing indicators, high quality media sharing, stickers, reactions, voice notes, and GIFs.

Apple, however, quickly blocked the app soon after its launch citing privacy and security concerns. The iPhone maker said in a statement that it acted against Beeper Mini’s iMessage service as it exploited “fake credentials.” Apple said that the techniques used by Beeper “posed significant risks to user security and privacy.”

Beeper Mini restored its iMessage service on December 11, but required users to users to log in using an Apple ID since phone number registration was unavailable. The company said that it had deregistered all phone numbers from the platform and all messages would be sent and received via the email address used in the user’s Apple ID.

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