Apple’s iOS 14 is due for a major showcase at the virtual WWDC 2020 event taking place this month. But that’s not stopping various leaks from teasing what the next iPhone operating system will have.
The latest leak comes courtesy of MacRumors, which noted that iOS 14 will have the ability to retract sent iMessages. If you’re someone who’s a little too fast at sending messages without considering their content or impact, then this feature could be a boon.
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According to the developer community that got its hands on an early build of iOS 14, the iMessage redaction feature will be visible to both parties, so the receiver of, say, an overly salacious message will see that it’s been sucked back up by the sender. This is all very well in terms of transparency, but seeing that a message has been retracted could raise a whole load of questions from the recipient.
Such a feature already exists in WhatsApp, with the ability to delete messages sent to another person or in a group chat. But that message is replaced by text that in no uncertain ways flags that the message has been deleted, meaning people can sneakily purge messages that might contain sensitive information or take a particularly racy joke a bit too far, for example.
Adding a redaction feature in iMessage would help bring Apple’s native iPhone messaging app up to speed with other services.
iOS 14 call recording
Another leak has signalled that iOS 14 will come with the ability to record incoming and outcoming calls on an iPhone, as flagged by 9to5Mac. This could be handy for journalists like us who want to have recordings of phone interviews to refer back to. But for others, it could be a slightly creepy feature that would seemingly fly in the face of Apple’s strong stance on privacy.
But more information around the feature has revealed that if such call recording does come to iOS 14 it will actually be used as a debugging tool for Apple and not a feature that will be made available for iPhone users.
These communication features are but the tip of the iceberg for iOS 14, with the next version of the mobile operating system expected to have a whole suite of more exciting upgrades. The biggest rumor is that iOS 14 maybring in home screen widgets to better serve up information and notifications without the need to open an app. Judging by concept videos we’ve seen, it looks like it could be a proper change for iOS.
Others features expected for iOS 14 include a list view for apps, a new multitasking interface, a new fitness app, and the ability to try out apps without downloading them first. With all that in mind, iOS 14 is shaping up to be a significant upgrade over iOS 13; hopefully it’ll have a smoother launch than iOS 13.5 as well.
