When the FBI warned iPhone and Android users to stop texting each other, it quickly became one of the most viral stories of the year. With Chinese hackers marauding through U.S. networks, the bureau alongside America’s cyber defense agency told citizens to use only end-to-end encrypted platform for messages.

While Apple’s iMessage and Google’s Messages are both fully encrypted, that security falls away when texting cross-platform. Apple’s platform is proprietary, and Google wraps encryption around the standard RCS protocol for its own users. When Apple added RCS to iMessage last fall, it quickly became clear this issue would only be resolved when the standard RCS protocol changed. Well, here we now are — kind of, as Apple has just confirmed.

GSMA — which alongside Google promised this day would come, has now confirmed its “next milestone — the availability of new GSMA specifications for RCS that include end-to-end encryption (E2EE) based on the Messaging Layer Security (MLS) protocol.”

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We knew MLS would likely be the way forward, but also that the challenges of doing this cross-platform would be significant. This will be a genuine game-changer, and the first real cross-platform competitor to Meta’s WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, both of which offer this full security to all users out of the box. The lack of cross-platform encryption has been such a headline issue for Apple for years, that the game-changing potential of this update cannot be overstated.

“Messages and other content such as files remain confidential and secure as they travel between clients," GSMA says. "RCS will be the first large-scale messaging service to support interoperable E2EE between client implementations from different providers. Together with other unique security features such as SIM-based authentication, E2EE will provide RCS users with the highest level of privacy and security for stronger protection from scams, fraud and other security and privacy threats. "

Apple was silent on the lack of full encryption between platforms and didn’t comment when Google and GSMA promised an upgrade was in the works. But notably it has now, telling 9to5Mac “end-to-end encryption is a powerful privacy and security technology that iMessage has supported since the beginning, and now we are pleased to have helped lead a cross industry effort to bring end-to-end encryption to the RCS Universal Profile published by the GSMA. We will add support for end-to-end encrypted RCS messages to iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and watchOS in future software updates.”

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This means all users will be able to use stock messengers built into their phones for fully secure comms for the first time. That same encryption could be used for calls, the way we use FaceTime or WhatsApp or Signal for voice and video, albeit that update is unlikely for now. It would be a serious change to the security on our handsets.

The potential loser in this is WhatsApp, as it seems to undermine its core privacy differentiation as a contrast to the others. It’s also ironic that this comes just as encrypted content is under threat in the U.K., Sweden and France, and after the FBI confirmed it would like lawful access to secure content as well.

There’s no view yet on timing, and this will be a major uplift. One expects some serious beta testing and a release to coincide with platform upgrades. Ideally this comes in time for iOS 19 — but we will just have to wait and see.