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Happened to us, we built a bot[1] to buy and sell bitcoins privately on Telegram. Someone messaged me saying that they would get a 'SCAM' label on our bot if we didn't pay them the ransom. We didn't comply and within a few days we got the label(guess they managed to get a lot of accounts on our bot to report scam). Their support team was unresponsive and it took around 3 weeks to get it resolved.

Needless to say, our users lost trust and we couldn't risk this happening again.

We still run the service(from request of a few existing users) but not actively promoting it.

[1] https://t.me/megadealsbot

Read the Telegram faq, bots are publicly available, so they are subject to take down requests. Chats and group chats are not.

https://telegram.org/faq#q-there-39s-illegal-content-on-tele...

Chats and group chats can also get the same SCAM label.

> They're apparently "encrypted", but the keys are controlled by Telegram.

Yes, but they take steps to ensure they cannot easily be forced to decrypt chats via a court order in a single country. From the Telegram FAQ:

To protect the data that is not covered by end-to-end encryption, Telegram uses a distributed infrastructure. Cloud chat data is stored in multiple data centers around the globe that are controlled by different legal entities spread across different jurisdictions. The relevant decryption keys are split into parts and are never kept in the same place as the data they protect. As a result, several court orders from different jurisdictions are required to force us to give up any data.

https://telegram.org/faq#q-do-you-process-data-requests

> Furthermore, they frequently "ban" channels that they deem contain "inappropriate" or "adult" content. Clearly they're reviewed by either humans or AI of some sort. So... that makes me uncomfortable.

AFAIK messages are only forwarded to Telegram support if they are reported by users. Chats spreading pornographic content are often banned on iOS due to the App Store guidelines (and in certain countries due to local laws), but illegal channels (e.g. CP) may be blocked globally.

> Also, this means that anyone who has your phone number is told you're on the app and given your username, which you may not want for privacy reasons.

This is not true anymore, a while ago they added new privacy settings that allow you to prevent others from finding you unless they are in your Telegram contact list. (Of course, this means if you don't want anyone in your phone's contacts to be able to find you on Telegram, you should deny the app contacts permission.)

> Yes, but they take steps to ensure they cannot easily be forced to decrypt chats via a court order in a single country. From the Telegram FAQ

Again, this is just what they claim. Doesn't mean they don't read chats because they feel like it. And this doesn't mean that they won't cooperate with other entities in the future. Or that the keys won't get leaked.

Your data being encrypted is pointless if it's stored one someone else's servers, and they have the keys to it.

"several court orders from different jurisdictions are required to force us to give up any data"

How can we as users be certain that they wouldn't decrypt our chats anyway, contrary to their stated policy?

As long as they have the technical capacity to decrypt my chats, I wouldn't feel secure on their platform, no matter what they say.

IMO it's a reasonable trade-off for general use as a chat platform with public groups and all, you can use secret chats if you really want to be confident in your privacy. Maybe they could add support for end-to-end encrypted groups though.

If we are going with a conspiracy theory that whatsapp deliberately included a buffer overrun bug as a backdoor... then why the heck would we trust telegram about this?

Telegram's clients are open source with verifiable builds. Sure, the back-end software isn't open source, but it's at least safer than WhatsApp.

Why?

I see no reason why open source helps here. Closed source clients aren't black boxes. You can examine the bytecode. You can decompile the binaries.

I see no reason why a conspiracy dedicated enough to hide a backdoor as a buffer overrun wouldn't also be capable of making the Telegram server store key material in a single country to make it available to legal requests (since, as you say. the back-end software isn't open source).

> I see no reason why open source helps here

Open source doesn't make things automatically secure, but one can't argue that it isn't much easier to inspect.

I really can.

Bytecode is basically the same as source. Decompiled binaries are harder to read, but there are oodles of professionals who are very skilled at reading decompiled code. The actual structure of the program itself plays (to me) a much bigger role in the auditability of a system.

Open source code is much easier easier to inspect than compiled bytecode, no matter how you look at it.

Many people have sent me stuff they want to keep secret on Telegram thinking they were in an end2end chat when they weren't. Terrible UX.

It's my understanding that one reason people like Telegram is unlike Signal, you can use a username and hide your phone number. (Please correct me if this is incorrect, I don't know anyone who uses it so I stick to Signal)

Signal is the gold standard for confidentiality, but forcing folks to disclose a phone number as a primary identifier has privacy issues.

I use both telegram and signal and I find that the general user experience (syncing chats across devices, bots, rich media types) is better in telegram, at the expense of privacy.

Telegram also has native, non-Electron apps, for many platforms, could it be an advantage? It also has convenient public chats and "channels" (microblogs). It has support for proxy servers, allows sharing proxy servers and has traffic obfuscation which Signal (I assume) doesn't have.

But for me Telegram and Signal are equally insecure because they don't allow anonymous accounts without a phone number. Using phone number for authentication is insecure because it is very easy to intercept SMS messages, especially if you are a telecom or the government. You better avoid using such messengers and not support them unless you want to provide your ID in future for registration on any website.

Telegram supports two-step verification with a password. As long as you have that enabled, your account can't be hacked with SMS interception.

The native apps certainly help… Signal’s desktop app is pure afterthought and it shows.

The other thing is that Telegram is just far more feature rich. It feels like what you’d like expect from a modern messaging app.

Perhaps the most unfortunate thing about this all, though, is that third party devs can’t make their own Signal clients to try to improve the situation. If you want to use Signal, you have to take it with all of its warts, and that’s a hard sell.

> Furthermore, telegram forces you to link your account with a phone number, and that acts as the primary (or only) form of authentication, opening you up to sim-jacking.

Linking phone or use it for 2FA should be like red light today. For Telegram, banking app, don't matter.

Turns out you can also add a password to your telegram account to act as a form of 2FA, kinda odd but that's that I guess.

Because Telegram like many mobile apps, doesn't want anonymous users because you cannot sell them to advertisers.

Actually, there's something interesting to note. If you enable 2FA, it's not possible to recover your account without either the password or the recovery email (if any). However, via SIM-jacking an attacker can still erase all data in your account and then take it over.

I really like the idea of Matrix. Is it really secure though? Isn't E2E a newer feature?

End-to-end encryption is available, but not yet enabled by default for private rooms/direct messaging. See this for status, it seems it will soon be enabled by default: https://github.com/vector-im/riot-web/issues/6779

Also interesting is to see that it has been adopted by the French government: https://lwn.net/Articles/779331/

It is amazing how fast the goalposts can move to fit a narrative. So chats in Matrix are not E2E encrypted? The very thing Telegram is being called out for in this thread?

If the chat isn't e2e, you are warned at every moment because the message text box that you type into prominently says "(unencrypted)". You can easily enable e2e for all conversations, and it will soon be the default. The data is on your own homeserver, and no one else has access to keys. Riot/matrix is vastly superior to telegram.

Edit: also, telegram doesn't support e2e encrypted group chats, unlike riot.

One of them does rather dishonest marketing, the other is upfront about capabilities and defaults.

Telegram: we do E2E!* That makes us MORE SECURE than other messengers!

Matrix: you can enable E2E if you want.

* just not by default†

† unless you count "E2E" security between your client and our servers,‡ which we'll confusingly highlight in our security documentation as if it were special††

‡ you don't really need E2E anyway because we store your data in shell companies across the world

†† I guess it is "special" because Telegram invented its own crypto algorithms?

I'd like Telegram a lot more if they would stop with their bullshit claims, because it's actually a good service for some usecases. While reading the article I was hoping it was just written by a clueless Telegram fanboy, but reality is disappointing…

I like Matrix+Riot.im, especially as a Slack killer and as a self-hosted option.

But in terms of getting less technical people on board (frankly, often the sort to go to WA anyhow), I deeply suggest Signal.

I understand that with MTProto 2 they stepped away from their homecooked crypto and follow a more traditional scheme which on the surface looks OK. It's still not the default (you must enter into a 'secret chat'), but if you do, isn't it acceptable? Telegram now is one of the last remaining clients that has excellent device support, its available for everything.

Does anybody have an idea why they don't make it default? Is there a cost involved? Any problems with it?

It's possibly because secret chats need to be started interactively (you can't send a message until the other party has come online), and later cannot be shared among different devices (open the same channel in desktop|web|mobile), so it degrades UX.

Signal has only e2e and is able to offer synced chat between phone and desktop - the phone just sends the content to the desktop instance and vice versa.

Nice.

I imagine multi-device sync and group chats would be a lot more complex with E2E encryption.

Works with Signal flawlessly.

I think it's because they want to give both usability (history shared between devices) and security (E2E encryption). Not anybody or any kind of conversation need encryption, so you as the end user can choose what's more appropriate.

TBH I don't know how other secure messaging programs like Signal or Wire handle the multi-device history issue.

From what I understood, each time a new device joins the conversation, a new key is generated for everyone in the conversation (and each devices), so they are allowed to decrypt others' messages. That being said, they can't access chat history.

With signal each registered device will receive a copy of the chat while that device is registered. If a new device is enabled afaik it doesn't get sent any messages from the past, although technically the other devices could transmit previous messages.

Groups on Telegram can have 100k+ members. Enabling Signal like E2E encryption scheme and ensuring you can have that many members in a group is basically impossible. See this video to understand why, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0_lcKrUdWg

I guess they could enable E2E encryption in private messages but being able to sync conversation across different telegram clients you are logged into is one of the features. Enabling E2E encryption by default will probably break this. I guess they could try and implement it like Signal has done for Private messages but I don't know why they have not done that already.

It's about priorities. Signal's priority is security. If the current state of the art is you can chose security or foozles, then Signal doesn't have foozles. If people really want foozles then they need to do the work to figure out how to deliver foozles securely and then Signal can integrate that work.

All of the other products have some other priorities, and so if security gets in the way, too bad security loses. Even WhatsApp, which uses the Signal protocol, has other priorities so the actual client software isn't focused on security, they were just happy to get a secure protocol out of the box.

The interesting thing is that years of research hasn't found many things that are just plain impossible securely, there are just a lot of unknowns or places where the secure option is harder. For example when you add a popcorn GIF to a chat Signal proxies this twice, masking your request from the GIF provider (Somebody used a popcorn GIF but the GIF provider doesn't learn who) and also from Signal's own servers (ishanjain28 used a GIF but Signal doesn't learn which one). Most outfits wouldn't bother, who cares about security anyway? But the feature now just works, without unnecessarily giving away information to people you might not trust.

_native_ clients, mind you. Their desktop client is built on top of (heavily patched) Qt and is relatively light on resources. That's pretty rare these days, unfortunately.

On macOS you have the option of using a Cocoa client (same codebase as the iOS version) in addition to the Qt app. It’s great to have the choice.

What is the point of going truly native on apps like chat?

They have a web version anyway and with Electron for desktop and webview for mobile, they can concentrate on the responsive single design instead of hiring different talents to communicate with each others left and right to slow down their development with inconsistencies.

I agree - Telegram's not ideal. But the reason they try and police adult content is because they're afraid of Apple booting them off the App store.

So Apple will boot an app that gives users the ability to send adult content to other users....?

That is completely ridiculous and if that is the reason Telegram is policing adult content then Telegram is ran by idiots. You can use any IM app to share adult content, there are plenty of groups on Whatsapp sharing porn, there are plenty of groups in iMessage sharing porn, there are porn accounts on Instagram and twitter, hell the entire reason snapchat even exists is so that you can send self destructing nudes to people.

The idea that an app will be banned due to content shared with people using the app, and not uploaded and/or hosted on some public website accessible to anyone (CP on tumblr) sounds completely ridiculous to me.

I disapprove of Apple’s puritanical approach to sex, and agree that this is ridiculous given that the logic applies equally well to literally all apps with groups or arbitrary URL web access, but it does appear to be the sincere justification for this situation.

A thought: I hear that most of the complaints about “adult” TV channels crossing the line from “broadcastable” to “violating obscenity laws” are made by their competitors. Perhaps a similar thing happens here? That at least one of Telegram’s competitors constantly look for reasons to get them blocked from the App Store?

There are other apps that use universal e2e encryption and have not been banned by Apple. Also if someone idi want to use Telegram for seedy purposes, they still can by enabling full security, so it’s pretty clear this excuse is flat out bogus. Otherwise all the same arguments would apply to the other apps.

You're not wrong. OTOH all it takes is media picking up on one single "hidden Telegram pedo network" and they'd get booted.

And it would be mostly due to public perception. Telegram is "used by terrorists because secret encryption" and already seen as suspicious.

Telegram offers channel subscriptions, it's like a blog without comments. Apple will absolutely ban apps like that (think tumblr).

No they won't.

- Instagram is stock full of sexual content

- A ton of cam models have private snapchat accounts where they share porn of themselves

- Reddit is basically a cornucopia of porn

- I can subscribe to a porn email list

- Share nudes to a group of friends on Facebook or even SMS

- I can join a hundred Discord channel to satisfy every single weird ass fetish I have,

- I can outright buy porn from Amazon and have it home delivered in 30 minutes.

And that's just from the top of my head. I'm sure you can find a metric ton of other apps that provide their users with easy access to sexual content. None of those apps will be banned for it since that is not the primary purpose of any of these apps. It's simply something that you're able to do with the tools provided. This is like banning all knives just because someone got stabbed.

If your plan is to ban apps that provide access to pornographic content, then you're gonna have to do a lot of banning.

Tumblr itself wasn't banned for porn, it was banned for child porn https://www.theverge.com/2018/11/20/18104366/tumblr-ios-app-...

I would also argue that a public blogsite where tagging and discovering new content is one of the key selling points of the platform, is very different from a Telegram channel where you need to specifically know the channel name to even join. As long as Telegram puts forth their best effort to eliminate illegal content from channels, they should be fine.

It might be OK for one app to allow such content and it might be not OK for Telegram. Because Telegram earlier had issues with Apple [1] and if they violate Apple's rules again it would become a convenient excuse to remove Telegram from App Store.

You are trying to find a reasoning in Apple's decisions, but isn't it easier to assume that not all apps are equally welcome in a private app store?

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2018/5/31/17412396/telegram-apple-a...

Please, note that the parent post talks about channels. It does not apply to chats and group chats.

> So Apple will boot an app that gives users the ability to send adult content to other users....?

Yes they will, if they're on channels (which are considered public).

Not only are Whatsapp groups and Snapchat chats are considered private, those companies have much more clout (and lawyers) than Telegram. Facebook threatening to remove Instagram/Facebook/Whatsapp from iOS would hurt Apple more than Facebook.

Side note: Even lists with no adult content, but referring to adult activities get banned. The creator of an app listing Burning Man events had to remove all references to adult workshops or get the banhammer. Apple's walled garden, Apple's rules (sigh).

Thankfully no one shares adult content on WhatsApp daily /s

That doesen't seem like a good reason at all

Shouldn't then Safari and all other browsers be banned as well? Lots and lots of adult content can be distributed and accessed with those.

Of course not. Some Apps get the preferencial treatment, eg. Sports Illustrated.

That's ridiculous. There are plenty of Reddit apps out there, for example, and they are just fine.

Telegram folks are just afraid that obscenity laws will be used against them by officially-not-censoring-but-actually-pretty-curious-about-everyone's-communications governments, like UK, France, Italy, and so on. "Oh, you cannot police your underage nudes? Law says we have to do it then, hand over the keys or shut it all down. We will absolutely not use these keys for anything else, honestly, uh-uh..."

That's the charitable reading that doesn't insult anyone's intelligence. I still don't particularly trust Telegram not to cooperate with authorities anyway - any centralized model is doomed to, at some point.

>>Furthermore, they frequently "ban" channels that they deem contain "inappropriate" or "adult" content. Clearly they're reviewed by either humans or AI of some sort. So... I don't like them much.

My understanding was that it isn't Telegram that bans them, but Apple that doesn't let certain channels be shown in the iOS app. Android and the web version show all channels.

Such channels aren't viewable on Android, dunno about web.

Apple doesn’t dig into third party apps to police their forums, chat channels and content. That is very clearly the responsibility of the app developers. More bullcrap excuses from Telegram. Come on. E2e disabled by default, phone numbers exposed by default. Channels stalked by moderators. It’s a joke.

My understanding was if Apple got a report about NSFW/hate speech/whatever channels, then they had to be hidden on the Apple version or else the app gets pulled from the app store.

As to the rest of the app's quality, no idea. I use it on my phone and it seems OK, but I've not really dug into it.

What about Signal?

Still trusted by both left coast technolibertariananarchists and Republicans in DC.

Do you have anything that you don't want a state level actor to know about?

If not, it's fine.

If you do, why are you using these sorts of technologies in the first place?

Well, Snowden said that's the one (https://twitter.com/snowden/status/986277159252750336) and he should know, right?

> Also, this means that anyone who has your phone number is told you're on the app and given your username, which you may not want for privacy reasons.

You can disable that behavior in your privacy settings iirc

And the reason this isn’t the default is?....

Because most people are not privacy conscious and just want their messaging app to work (including having people know they are available to message on said platform).

"Telegram is banned in Russia"

Really? I just went there recently, and nearly everyone used Telegram as their primary messaging application (other than Instagram)

Really. It's a constant fight between Telegram and the not-so-great Russian Firewall. There are actually public channels you can join in Telegram that run a tally of Telegram IPs blocked by Roskomnodzor.

We even had a speaker advertise a telegram channel for everyone I was there with to talk to each other, and the Russian audience laughed to his amusement. I didn't get the joke; kind of funny now.

I still never ended up using it, have too many messaging apps as it is. It's really sad how much that can limit staying in touch with international friends though.

> Furthermore, they frequently "ban" channels that they deem contain "inappropriate" or "adult" content. Clearly they're reviewed by either humans or AI of some sort. So... that makes me uncomfortable.

If you are uncomfortable about content being read by humans -- (they claim) that only happens for public channels (open for anyone to read/search)

Time to push for Briar[1], again[2]

[1] https://briarproject.org/

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17695266

Sharing a URL with no meaningful supporting words isn’t pushing. What’s interesting, comparing to existing messengers?

Sorry, you are right. That being said, it's a remarkable approach to messaging. E2E, decentralized, can be used over WiFi, Tor, Bluetooth (In case there is a blockage)[1]. Has been pentest reviewed[2] before the first release.

Or to sum up:

"Briar is a messaging app designed for activists, journalists, and anyone else who needs a safe, easy and robust way to communicate. Unlike traditional messaging tools such as email, Twitter or Telegram, Briar doesn't rely on a central server - messages are synchronized directly between the users' devices. If the Internet's down, Briar can sync via Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, keeping the information flowing in a crisis. If the Internet's up, Briar can sync via the Tor network, protecting users and their relationships from surveillance."

[1] https://briarproject.org/how-it-works/

[2] https://briarproject.org/raw/BRP-01-report.pdf

Seems one of its biggest problems is it's probably not possible to develop an iOS client:

https://code.briarproject.org/briar/briar/issues/445

Why you don't recommend Tox ? P2P software is always better than server depending software.

They mostly ban content for Apple users because of Appstore restrictions. And they ban Isis group chats which is a good thing in my book.

Better use P2P chat groups like Tox or Retroshare