If you’ve ever tried asking your Google Assistant to send out a text message for you when your phone is locked, you’ve probably gotten the “Unlock to continue” response from it. But now it looks like Google is testing out a way that you’ll still be able to send that SMS without having to unlock your smartphone. This seems to be a server-side update so there’s no way to force it for your account unless you’re one of the lucky users chosen to test out this feature.
It’s always been a tricky dance to balance convenience with security when it comes to voice commands. The latter has been the primary consideration that’s why we’re not able to send SMS through Google Assistant when our devices are locked. But according to an article on 9 to 5 Google, the tech giant may be changing its mind about this or at least trying to see how it should work out if they ever roll out this feature.
If you tell your Google Assistant to “send a text”, normally you will have to unlock it first to continue. But if you’re one of the A/B test subjects, if you specify the user you want to send the text to and what the message actually is, it will actually continue and send you a visual and verbal confirmation that you do want to send the message and then acknowledging that it has been able to send it to your intended recipient.
As we said, lockscreen texting doesn’t seem to be available to a wide number of users. Even Pixel 3 owners aren’t all gifted with the functionality. Some users who had the ability to do it also eventually lost it for some random reason that only the folks over at Google know. We’re not sure if this is even intentional but it should be something that users have been requesting.
If they do decide to roll it out in one form or another, it should not be limited to Pixel devices since Google Assistant is available to other Android devices and even non-smartphone devices as well. We’ll keep you updated on future developments about this.
