Apple's iMessage may finally expand to Android.
Citing an anonymous source that is said to be familiar with Apple's plans, MacDailyNews said Apple will "definitely" be bringing iMessage to Android this year, possibly announcing it as soon as next week at the company's annual Worldwide Developers Conference.
The news follows a report from 9to5Mac earlier this year, where CEO Tim Cook discussed porting additional services to Android. While iMessage was not named by Cook, it would be a logical next service to be released across multiple platforms.
According to data released by the Pew Research Center in August, 36% of smartphone owners reported using messaging apps such as WhatsApp, Kik or iMessage on their smartphones. The percentage of users using messaging apps climbs to 49% when looking at the coveted millennial demographic of smartphone owners, which for Pew's study, were bracketed between 18 and 29. This type of popularity has lead to apps such as WhatsApp being acquired by Facebook for $19 billion in 2014 and Snapchat reportedly valued at $20 billion last month.
IMessage wouldn't be the first app Apple has brought to Android, having released the "Move to iOS" transfer tool and Apple Music apps last year. Making iMessage available on multiple platforms would also increase the company's position in the growing messaging apps battle. Nearly all rival messaging services, including Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Snapchat, Kik, Skype and Google Hangout, run on multiple platforms. Last month Google announced two new messaging apps, Allo for text and Duo for video, and said both would be available on Android and iOS this summer.
Bringing iMessage to Android would also allow Apple to offer secure, encrypted chats to more users. The company famously clashed with the United States government earlier this year over privacy, and iMessage on Android would allow Apple to secure chats even when not between iOS users.
IMessage is one of the few messaging apps with end-to-end encryption, which involves using a code to lock the data once the user sends it, while in transit, and up to the point when it's unlocked by the recipient. Apple's FaceTime also has end-to-end encryption, and in wake of Apple's fight, Facebook-owned WhatsApp announced it was adding the same feature to its apps. But many popular messaging apps only encrypt in transit.
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