Do you enjoy using iMessage to send messages to others, but are wondering if your messages are safe from others?
One thing that can be a bit of a concern is your phone bill, and the information that shows up on it.
But does your iMessage history appear on the bill? What sorts of things can be seen?
In this article, I’ll be answering all of that and more!
Does iMessage History Show Up On The Bill?
No. Your iMessages cannot show up on your phone bill, because they are sent over the internet, rather than through your cellular provider. Additionally, Apple encrypts iMessage conversations end-to-end, making it impossible for the contents to appear on your bill, even if your cellular provider wanted to show them.
Therefore, you don’t have to worry about anyone seeing the contents of your messages, as long as every message is sent over iMessage. I’ll go over how you can ensure your messages will always be sent via iMessage (instead of accidentally sending an SMS, which cellular providers can see) a little later.
For now, just know that even if your cellular provider wanted to see the contents of your iMessage conversation and display them on the phone bill, it is technologically impossible for them to do so.
How Apple’s Encryption Protects Your Messages
To understand why texts sent over iMessage are so secure, it helps to understand a little about how end-to-end encryption works.
Essentially, the contents of your message get all scrambled up while they’re in transit. If somebody were to try to peek in on your conversation while it was being sent, all they would see is a bunch of unreadable, illegible data – they would not see what was actually being said.
On your device as well as the other person’s device, your iPhone / iPad has a special ‘key’ that can decipher that random data, and therefore show the actual message that was being sent.
Because the keys are only stored on your devices, this makes it technologically impossible for anyone but the two of you to ever decrypt the messages.
So, even if your cellular provider or Apple were to spy on or save a copy of the encrypted messages, they would not be able to read them, even if they wanted to.
And since your cellular provider can’t see the conversation at all, it would be impossible for it to appear on your cell phone bill in any way.
This is true for all carriers worldwide – AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint are just a few examples!
What iMessage Information Can Be Seen On The Bill?
So, what information – if any, can be seen on the bill?
There are two areas that may cause you a bit of concern.
The first, as mentioned earlier, is in regards to regular text messages being sent by accident. You can recognize a regular SMS text message being sent, because the bubble will be green, rather than blue.
If text messages are sent instead of iMessages, your cellular provider will be able to see these, and depending on your provider, some information may appear on the bill. Most commonly, it will list the number you sent a text to, and the quantity of the messages.
It’s not common for the contents of SMS messages themselves to appear on the bill. However, for more information, see this article about what appears on the phone bill when you send regular text messages.
Thankfully, Apple has a built-in way to see whether or not your message will send via SMS or iMessage – even if you’ve never texted that number before!
All you’ve got to do is look at the color of the arrow next to the box where you type.
If it’s blue, it will send via iMessage. If it’s green, it will send via SMS. Pretty neat, right?
If you are particularly worried, you can also send all your messages over a solely internet-based messenger app, like Signal or WhatsApp. With these applications, it’s impossible for messages to go through your cellular provider at all.
So, with that covered, there is one more thing that you may be concerned about.
While any data related to iMessages won’t be visible on the bill, your phone bill will likely show the total amount of data used.
Because iMessages are sent and received over the internet, they will contribute to your used mobile data. This also includes multimedia messages, like photos or videos.
Conclusion
Due to Apple’s built-in encryption, it is impossible for the contents of your iMessages – or any aspect of your iMessage history, to appear on your phone bill.
That being said, more information may be available if you send messages over SMS, so you’ve got to be careful in order to avoid this from happening.
I hope that this article has answered your questions, and you no longer have to worry about your iMessage conversations being seen by others.
If you have any other questions about iMessage – or anything else I’ve mentioned in this article, please ask them below and I’ll be happy to get back to you.
Wishing you the best,
– James McAllister
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