goes to show you how tight Apple’s ecosystem is.
Convincing to Signal may be possible, it could take some time, I could also dm some solution to it if it will convince them.
Anyways I have to say, If your family revolve around Apple then yeah keep using an iPhone and do things like enable ADP on iCloud and stuff like that.
Yeah, that is going to be a huge bummer. Would if I delete most of the preinstalled apps and use more privacy friendly ones like on the recommendations page on PG?
That would be your best option. In fact, rather than considering which phone/OS to use it’s more important to consider what you do on your device and what apps you decide to install.
This is a ridiculous suggestion. One phone is sufficient for OP’s threat model.
I had the same situation and just like the government I’m using child safety to manipulate policy but in favor of privacy versus against it.
Also with all the neoliberal monopoly capitalistic agendas flying around, it’s become much easier to make the case for the need for privacy as we can’t assume plain boring politics where stuff is shoved under the rug. Capitalism and gov collusion is shameless as it was in the last gilded age.
That ‘1’ missing feature, encrypted private communications between people, is a major and completely relevant feature. If all of your comms are suddenly sent via regular sms, then it’s rather arguable that the other benefits of grapheneOS outweigh that.
Are people really using SMS with their comms? I honest don’t know a single person anymore that is not at least using WhatsApp.
My whole family is using iPhone and iPad. Not a chance going for GOS. It is also not compatible with my banking app, which is a no-go for me.
I don’t want to go deep into Android vs iOS topic, but apps are much better on iOS side. OS support is also better. Yes, Apple did some crappy stuff like intentionally decreasing battery power, but still their OS is the most seamless one.
Yes, it is not as privacy friendly as GOS, but for me and my family, it is not worth leaving Apple ecosystem. I am not using Mac, but got iPads, iPhones, Apple Watches and Apple TV.
As for messaging, Signal still has issues, even after all those years. Notifications are not coming from time to time and video call quality is still very bad. I am using Facetime, Google Meet and Whatsapp for video calls, and iMessage, Whatsapp and sometimes Signal for messaging. I don’t know when I last used SMS.
Yep, I have to talk to multiple people with SMS and unencrypted RCS and it’s painful. 
Sometimes they don’t have enough storage for yet another messenger but one person doesn’t trust anything else. Goes to show how much emotion place a factor for the average persons security.
tbh I occasionally send SMS where necessary but like 99% of my communication I want them to come from either RCS or Signal or Maybe Viber but if I have no choice like my sister and family for viber.
but for like say one of my friends, my uncle and a physiotherapist, One uses a realme phone (ew but yeah), the other 2 use an iPhone kinda forced to use SMS/MMS. Old people are always the exception but you know.
And I usually do Cellular Tower Calls… Again Not Ideal but this is the kind we’re used to.
This is mostly a US issue, especially when everyone has an iPhone. I am more likely to switch over to GOS later this year since my family and friends are somewhat active over Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.
Of course, that is not very ideal compared to Signal but hey slow steps!
Are those people that you keep long chats or just occasional conversation to keep life going? I really struggle to see a human in 2025 still sending SMS to ask how my day is going and know some stuff about me. Nowadays I assume that an SMS is either a SPAM or shit bank 2FA that isn’t secure enough to move to a proper authentication app.
I get it, old folks are tough, they tend to call and ignore SMS in my case, lol.
Yeah, I’m aware about the US intense use of iPhones compared to the rest of the world. Still that iPhones will continue to be even in third world countries actually a symbol of status and many will likely desire to achieve one. I think trying GOS will be interesting if you have the option. Using an iPhone for now isn’t total bad, like you said, baby steps.
Good question! Most of my SMS/RCS communication is infrequent which is probably another reason they don’t care to switch. However, we have sensitive conversations so I feel like that should’ve been a motivating factor for them to use Signal.
I am a fan of iOS as I am already an iOS user. It recently got updated to 18.3 and the features are quite amazing.
So, for me with wanting to use my phone less which means less features. The only thing I seem to be losing is imessege. If I do switch maybe 3 people will use signal but everyone else will be SMS. Is this still a good move?
why not best of both worlds?
Use those 3 to get to Signal
and use the rest for iMessage.
That is true, but then the use the phone less thing still plays a part. I know that is mostly on me with will power but seeing GOS basic apps only downloaded and nothing else for sure is enticing
Privacy has one clear requirement, you only use FOSS software. leave one closed-source software on your device and you have no privacy on it.
iOS is a closed-source software that you can’t remove on iphones, so don’t use that.
grapheneOS is FOSS so you can read the code, and after reading it you’ll see that it does everything to prevent you from being spied on, so it’s suitable for private use.
This is completely over the top. Foss is preferable yes, but saying something cannot be private because it contains a small piece of closed source software is false.
Foss is not only preferable, it’s a requirement for privacy.
with closed-source software the possibility of trusting the tech is not there, at least when you can read the code the possibility of trusting it is there, not otherwise.
i know i’m preaching in the desert with you but i respect that audience too much
when trusting closed-source software you place your trust in people, you can’t trust people when it comes to privacy (and people are easily coerced into complying with whatever their government demands). The only thing that can be trusted is code that you can audit yourself, transparency is a requirement for privacy, you can’t escape it