IOS 12 combining text messages

Yeah, but you can’t control what other people do with their phones. So if 2 of your friends share an Apple ID, their messages are combining on your phone. Kind of out of your control and not a great move on Apple since they know lots of people share Apple IDs, wether they support it or not.

I also read that several people got their own Apple ID and it did not correct the problem.

Wow, perhaps Apple could take some "how to clearly state something" lessons from you.

This is unclear?

https://appleid.apple.com/faq/#!&page=faq

That they do not prevent you from sharing Apple IDs is an acknowledgement they can't possibly prevent it.

They clearly do advise against it.

I am having the same issue as well and opened a different thread called "Text messages going to wrong recipients after iOS12 upgrade." There are four of us on the same Apple account. Per the suggestions from my thread I have slowly been seperating the accounts. We are now on different Apple accounts. One of us is still using the original account. The problem is persisting however. I was txting fine with my son last night after creating a brand new account for him. However this morning after txting my daughter, the history of his txt is now within my daughter's history. It's very fustrating. Also per the suggestion of posting I will be cleaning up our contacts next by deleting the other members of our family. Other things I've tried: deleting all txting history, turning off Handoff, editing the contacts for my family. I also want to add that I am the only one with the issue and the only one who updaed to iOS12.

Make sure, the new accounts are properly signed in in Settings->Messages and Settings->Facetime and Settings->Account->iCloud to complete the separation

Signing in to to just the iTunes Store will not change anything, and signing in to just iCloud or just Facetime will not affect Messages.

So is there a consensus about fixing this other than to separate accounts?

My parents are the texts it is combining but visible to me. In one text string. They share an account but both phones are set up to send and receive only from their individual phone numbers.

I don’t understand why it’s mixing the messages

A Phone number is not an account or Apple ID

Sharing an Apple ID is what is causing messages to merge. Sharing Apple IDs is not supported by Apple, it not supposed to be done, and things like this will happen unless you separate them.

When an Apple ID is shared, the system, automatically thinks the devices belong to the same person and will merge things since to the system and the way Apple designed in an Apple ID uniquely identifies a single person.

Apple has always expected people to have their own Apple Id and not share it. So any updates and software changes depart from that assumption. Sharing an Apple ID can lead to many unintended consequences.

Unless you wish to continue to have issues every time something changes in iOS, its best to get them separate Apple IDs.

KimJT wrote:

Kind of out of your control and not a great move on Apple since they know lots of people share Apple IDs, wether they support it or not.

That's ridiculous. Apple is not responsible for the stupidity of others.

I also read that several people got their own Apple ID and it did not correct the problem.

Because they didn't bother do the job correctly.

Thanks for the input. I realize having four people on one account is not recommended, however as I stated we never had this issue before. With that said, I took everyone’s advice and we are now on four separate accounts with Family Share going. Guess what? The problem still exists on my phone. It seems to be mostly now between myself and my son and daughter. I can txt my daughter because when I try my son’s txting history appears. The funny part iis that my son’s account was brand new. My daughter is using the original account. I’ve even deleted the txt history on my phone and their Contacts. Did not help AND their txting history magically reappeared. But not daughters. At this point I will be waiting for the first iOS patch and hope they fix it.

With a separate ID for each family member being the fix, how does Apple suggest we limit our teens App Store downloads since they have their own ID?

Why all of a sudden does Apple feel they need to combine family members text accounts using the family ID when they didn’t before?

KiltedTim thanks for the input. I get the fact that Apple never supported sharing ids. The all of a sudden is with iOS 12. Everything was fine until I updated. Also, my family has not updated and their phones are fine. Our Apple accounts are now separate but the issue persists on my phone where txts are combined between my daughter and son.

Very concerning that even after separating your IDs the issue persists. This is a big problem for me and will mean creating 4 new accounts. I definitely do not want to go to all of this effort if it will not resolve the issue. In the short term, I think I am going to have to try an alternate app for messaging.

Just updated and encountered this problem. Yeah, don't care to set up 6 new IDs, especially if people are reporting that may not fix it. We're going to try turning off and deregistering from iMessage in the meantime.

Totally incorrect...this is only true since family sharing was added as a feature. Before that Apple allowed/permitted/suggested shared Apple ID's to share apps, music, etc. After family sharing was added they are trying to force everyone into a separate ID....we tried that several times but Apple's servers have a bug and would not let my wife have her own after we shared. This is pure B.S. and Apple better fix. The issue isn't that this is how this should work, combining messages for same Apple ID's...its sporadic...does it sometimes and then after deleting conversations it separates them again, for a while then does it again...that's pure bug...this is not the user's fault...fix this Apple!

I've tried about everything.

Previously me, my wife, both her parents, and my mom shared an Apple ID. Since updating to iOS 12, only my wife has had a problem with the texts from me and her mom being merged, and her only being able to text one of us (depending on which of us had texted her last I think). None of the rest of us have had a problem before or after despite being on the same Apple ID.

Turning off and deregistering iMessage didn't help. So I wasted an hour or so setting up new Apple IDs. Made sure my mother-in-law was on a separate ID for everything. Set up family sharing. Didn't help. If I get it working for a bit and my wife has 2 separate text conversations for me and her mom, as soon as I restart her phone, they merge and one of the conversations disappears.

The fact that this problem still persists after setting up new IDs and it only happens in one case on my wife's phone (an iPhone 6 64GB AT&T) makes me think this is an iOS bug and not the intent of the new "streamlined messages."

Next I'm going to try a full erase and restore on her phone. We'll wait a little while for a bug-fixing update. Then our next fix will be to buy an Android.

bobatrek wrote:

How does Apple suggest we limit our teens App Store downloads since they have their own ID?

When you use Family Sharing you can set each child with the option "Ask to Buy." That way you will get a message saying they want to purchase or download an app. You can then approve or decline it. Also, you can set app limits by using Screen Time. However, if you are all sharing an ID then your Screen Time statistics won't help any and any restrictions you set up for apps will combine the time from all devices using that app.