Singapore Orders Changes to iMessage by December

Singapore has ordered Apple to artifact oregon filter messages connected iMessage that impersonate authorities agencies, requiring the institution to instrumentality caller anti-spoofing protections by December arsenic portion of efforts to curb rising online scams, the Straits Times reports.


Singapore's Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said that it had issued an Implementation Directive to Apple nether the Online Criminal Harms Act, instructing the institution to forestall iMessage accounts and radical chats from utilizing names that mimic Singapore authorities agencies oregon the "gov.sg" sender ID. The directive besides applies to Google Messages, with some companies required to comply by November 30.

MHA said the bid was indispensable due to the fact that iMessage does not presently enactment the safeguards built into Singapore's registered SMS sender ID system. Since July 2024, morganatic messages sent by Singapore authorities agencies done accepted SMS channels person utilized the "gov.sg" sender ID to assistance the nationalist verify authenticity.

Messages sent via iMessage, however, bash not walk done the aforesaid ID registry and truthful let scammers to contiguous themselves utilizing identical oregon near-identical identifiers. The ministry cited much than 120 constabulary reports successful which scammers impersonated registered sender IDs.

As portion of the directive, Apple indispensable present guarantee that illustration names of chartless iMessage senders are either not displayed oregon are shown little prominently than the telephone numbers associated with the account. Authorities said this request is intended to springiness users a clearer presumption of the individuality accusation slightest susceptible to manipulation. Messages oregon radical chats that look to spoof authorities identifiers indispensable either beryllium blocked wholly oregon filtered truthful that recipients bash not spot them.

Apple's compliance volition necessitate changes to iMessage's show logic and name-handling behaviour successful Singapore, creating an objection to the platform's long-standing reliance connected unverified user-defined sender names successful one-to-one and radical messaging threads. iMessage does not presently usage a sender ID registry oregon outer sanction verification scheme, and the caller rules people 1 of the archetypal instances of a authorities requiring compulsory filtering for circumstantial categories of show names wrong Apple's messaging ecosystem.

The MHA said Apple and Google person indicated that they volition comply with the directive. If they neglect to instrumentality the mandated controls, the companies could look penalties.
This article, "Singapore Orders Changes to iMessage by December" archetypal appeared connected MacRumors.com

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