Google is silently blocking RCS on rooted Android phones and custom ROMs (Update)
www.androidauthority.com
Google famously campaigned for Apple to "get the message" and use RCS, but now doesn't let rooted Android users use RCS.

TL;DR

  • Users who have rooted their phone, have their bootloader unlocked or are using some custom ROMs report that their RCS messages are not being sent, even though RCS shows them as connected.
  • The Google Messages app does not show any error messages when blocking RCS messages of these users and does not send the messages out as SMS or MMS either.
  • Google famously campaigned for Apple to include RCS messaging in iMessage but is now blocking it for certain Android users.
  • @noodlejetski@lemm.eeEnglish
    8•4 months ago

    How is Google going to stop them?

    well, so far none of the third party SMS apps have implemented RCS support, and when asked, every developer replies that they need Google to open their standard for other clients to use, so I guess they’ve been doing a pretty good job at stopping everyone else.

    • Draconic NEOEnglish
      1•4 months ago

      Have they given a reason why the specifically not able to do it, or do they just not want to do it because it’s “unlicensed” or “out of spec” if it’s just the second option then it’s a problem of having unwilling people and not a real entry barrier.

      If there’s an actual barrier to developing something like that it’s important to understand what it is.

      • @noodlejetski@lemm.eeEnglish
        1•4 months ago

        Have they given a reason why the specifically not able to do it

        yes, every time the reason given was Google not opening their API to the public.