Impact of Deprecation of FCM Sender IDs on Wingify Engage

#Overview

Starting March 22, 2020, Chrome versions 81 and 82 disallow the creation of any new subscriptions using FCM Sender IDs. However, versions 78, 79, and 80 of Chrome will still allow the FCM Sender IDs that were used before September 2019. All the other FCM Sender IDs will be rejected.

Wingify Engage started using Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM) a couple of years ago. It’s a free service that facilitates messaging between apps and server applications.

#About FCM Sender ID

The FCM Sender ID is a unique numerical value generated in the Google Developers Console / Google Cloud Console when configuring your projects. The project number is typically the FCM Sender ID and is used during the registration process to identify an app server that can send messages to the client app.

To look for the Sender ID in your Firebase account:

1. From the Firebase dashboard, select a project.
2. From the panel on the left, click on the settings icon.
3. From the project settings that appear on the page, go to the Cloud Messaging tab to find the Sender ID.

#Purpose of FCM Sender ID

The FCM Sender ID is typically used to identify the sender of a push notification. For example, Wingify Engage or you can be the sender of push notifications.

If you have used the default push configuration settings and have not registered your own FCM Sender ID, all of your FCM subscriptions belong to the Engage Sender ID. Alternatively, if you did not use the default push configuration settings and have registered your own FCM Sender ID via the developer console, your subscriptions belong to your own FCM Sender ID.

#Reasons for FCM Sender ID Deprecation

VAPID (Voluntary Application Server Identification) is the latest sending method that is being widely used across Web Push Notification Services. Compared to FCM, VAPID not only improves the delivery rate but also enhances the overall performance of Push Notification Services. This is typically based on our recent observations, analysis, and reports.

Additionally, VAPID supports more browsers than FCM (for example, Microsoft Edge and Mozilla Firefox). This means an increase in the subscriber base.

#How Wingify Engage Addressed the FCM Sender ID Deprecation

When Google announced it would deprecate FCM Sender IDs and suggested developers update to VAPID as soon as possible, Wingify Engage changed its default subscription mechanism to VAPID, since it offered better performance than FCM Sender IDs.

Note: Your existing subscriptions will continue to work on FCM, but your future subscriptions will be latched to VAPID only. This has no direct effect on your account.

#Need more help?

For further assistance or more information, contact Wingify Support.