Again in November, the Sunbird messaging app, which powered the Nothing Chats messaging app, shut down attributable to safety considerations. The Sunbird app allowed Android customers to make use of iMessage for messaging even all the way down to having blue bubbles, high-quality pictures, learn receipts, typing indicators, and extra. Whereas Sunbird promised customers that they’d have end-to-end encryption for consumer messages and recordsdata, customers’ Apple login information was not encrypted clearly creating an enormous safety concern.
With 630,000 recordsdata weak to this exploit, Sunbird determined to halt all of its providers together with its Play Retailer app. However Sunbird is re-launching its iMessage for Android app.
In a press release, Sunbird introduced that its messaging app has been relaunched and 165,000 Android customers are on the waitlist. A small variety of invites have been disseminated.
Sunbird has up to date its AV1 Message system which is now AV2 and it’s designed to maintain messages secure. As Sunbird notes, “Unencrypted messages are by no means saved anyplace on disk or in a database. When messages are decrypted to be handed to the iMessage and RCS/Google Messages community, they exist in that state solely inside reminiscence for a restricted time period. Within the front-end app, messages are solely saved in an encrypted state inside the in-app database.”
The underside line so far as Sunbird is worried is that “Since November, the Sunbird workforce has labored emigrate the iMessage implementation off of AV1 to the AV2 structure. With the adoption of AV2, we imagine that we’ve not solely resolved the safety vulnerabilities beforehand recognized but in addition offered a safe and privacy-oriented basis for Sunbird’s iMessage integration shifting ahead.”
You’ll be able to be a part of the Waitlist for Sunbird by
tapping on this link and urgent on “Be part of the Waitlist.” You would possibly surprise why that is crucial if Apple will help RCS later this yr. The reply is straightforward; regardless of Apple including help for RCS, these utilizing the latter will nonetheless have inexperienced textual content bubbles. For these Android customers involved about getting teased for being inexperienced, outdoors of shopping for an iPhone, utilizing Sunbird may be the subsequent finest answer.Â
The builders admitted that they may have used the downtime since November to launch a fast repair to patch the vulnerabilities. However Sunbird stated, “We acknowledged that such an strategy wouldn’t align with our core values or our unwavering dedication to the privateness and safety of our customers.”Sunbird added, “We determined to take the chance to completely reevaluate each our technical implementations and our organizational processes from the muse up. This choice was pushed by our perception within the paramount significance of belief and security in our platform. It displays our dedication to not simply resolving the quick points at hand but in addition to making sure that we uphold the very best requirements of safety and privateness for our neighborhood in the long run.”
