Pictures are transmitted to a wireless picture phone with caller ID from a message originator and used by the message recipient to identify who is to sending the picture. In one embodiment the pictures are sent to a message center along with the caller ID of the message originator, with a caller ID and picture transmitted from the message center to the picture phone. The picture message may be encrypted, compressed or encoded. Additionally, the received caller ID may be used by the message recipient to place a call to the message originator using a cellular or wireless network.