Beeper Mini launched on Tuesday with the promise of bringing secure iMessage to Android, and indeed it worked wonderfully. However, less than a week later, the app seems to be broken.
iMessage apps for Android have become more and more common lately, but usually with murky security setups. Beeper Mini, however, took a wild and totally new approach in completely reverse engineering iMessage to allow users to sign into their Apple ID directly as well as linking their Android phone number. In fact, the company even figured out how to let you link your phone number only and skip Apple ID completely. It worked really well too.
But the big question was how long the app would actually work.
Well, we might have our answer, as this afternoon Beeper Mini has abruptly stopped working for seemingly all users.
Many reports across Reddit and other platforms confirm that Beeper Mini is currently unable to send or receive messages for many users. Some also report that Apple ID sign-in is currently not working if the app is re-installed or activated on a new device.
The reason here is currently unclear, but in our own testing the app brings back an error message saying “failed to lookup on server; lookup request timed out.”
We’ve reached out to Beeper for comment and, while a reason was not provided, CEO Eric Migicovsky confirmed that the company is looking into it. In a reply on Reddit, someone from Beeper says the issue is on their side.
Update: Speaking to 9to5Google, Migicovsky implies that the issue may indeed be from Apple, but doesn’t directly confirm as such. However, speaking to TechCrunch, he said that “all data indicates” that it was Apple.
If it’s Apple, then I think the biggest question is – if Apple truly cares about the privacy and security of their own iPhone users, why would they try to kill a service that enables iPhones to send encrypted chats to Android users? With their announcement of RCS support, it’s clear that Apple knows they have a gaping hole here. Beeper Mini is here today and works great. Why force iPhone users back to sending unencrypted SMS when they chat with friends on Android?
Notably, users have also since found that the de-register option within Beeper Mini is not working.
Updating…
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