Retrieving deleted iMessages

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Retrieving deleted iMessages

Is it possible to retrieve long-deleted (one to two years) iMessages, associated with my Apple ID, from Apple's servers? And, if it is, under what conditions is this allowed?

I ask, because I find myself in a thorny personal (and possibly legal) situation, wherein unaltered transcripts of conversations would surely vindicate me. The other party involved has saved these conversations, but I know for a fact that she has deleted portions of those chats, in an effort to cast herself in a more flattering light. Unaltered transcripts of these exchanges would help me avoid messy and expensive legal action.

Posted on Jan 23, 2015 6:01 AM

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Answer 1

Jan 25, 2015 12:15 PM in response to johnolore

Hi,

Unfortunately not.

Once delivered they are deleted from the servers.

At best if a Mac or iPhone is Off Line for a period then you might get it to "catch-up" when it is turned On (my personal experience is two days from a Conversation with my wife from a Hotel wifi being caught up on th Sunday evening when I turned on my Computer).

It appears there is a Time Limit to this where the server continue to "push" the messages to the device.

On the Mac if you have Save on Close then you may have the conversations.

Also on the Mac the Chat.db items will show the Chat if you contact them again (which I can see would be difficult).

8:15 pm Sunday; January 25, 2015

 iMac 2.5Ghz i5 2011 (Mavericks 10.9)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

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