
Verified SMS from Google - coloneltcb
https://www.blog.google/products/messages/safer-conversations-messages-verified-sms-and-spam-protection/
======
stevenicr
So this means that when sending or receiving, if you have this 'update "turned
on"' \- the local cell tower gets my message, whatever phone companies that
own the lines around there get my messages, att gets my messages, my cell
phone provider gets my messages, my friend has the message recorded in reverse
by his/her cell co, whatever company owns the tower that is local to them, and
who ever runs the transit to / from there, and now ALSO google gets my
messages?

So they can all read them, store them, give them / sell them to other
people... I understand that the phone companies have certain, (imho not
enough), regulatory issues with carrying data, but I'm not sure google's new
intercept for spam and badge service does similarly..

I now also wonder, even though I denied the update, but what if the gf/bf
accepted the update, that means google is getting a copy via their intercept
right?

Can someone offer a rough calculation of how many people have easy access to
all our text messages? (not including big DB hacks like the recent one from
that B2B co) - just in general.

There are some things I liked about this rcs update, but at what cost.

~~~
RKearney
> and now ALSO google gets my messages?

From the linked article:

> When a message is verified—which is done without sending your messages to
> Google—you’ll see the business name and logo as well as a verification badge
> in the message thread.

~~~
stevenicr
Thanks for the info there, I see near the end in regards to the spam issue is
also says: "Spam protection, which works with your message data while keeping
your messages private"

It's partially because of my assumptions that they would need to see messages
in order to determine if they are spam or from a 'verified' business.. but
also language like this:

"we warn you of suspected spam and unsafe websites we’ve detected. If you see
a suspected spam warning in Messages you can help us improve our spam models
by letting us know if it’s spam or not."

Makes it sounds like they (google) are detecting spam sites, and we can engage
in 'letting us know' \- like it's a connect with google..

but I guess there is some other way they are handling this stuff (a shared db
af bad stuff between carriers so only they need to read msgs?) and keeping
'your message private' \- which now I have to read that and wonder if that
means something slightly different than what I first thought it did..

------
techntoke
It appears based one recent updates that Google is abandoning Hangouts and
reverting back to Google Voice.

~~~
bynkman
I recently had to stop using Hangouts, having to change to
messages.google.com. I liked the Hangouts web UI better. There's some
unfriendliness to Messages. I understand Google wanting to consolidate
messaging. I just wish they would have merged all their messaging in a
sensible way.

