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Comment by eddvdm | Hacker News Reader

> Telegram, an application used by hundreds of millions of people including heads of states and large companies, has had no issues of that severity in the last 6 years.

Maybe the author says "of that severity" because he keeps adding "the richest man on the planet" there, but most people in Brazil wouldn't agree with him.

He sure have heard about Operation Car Wash and how it took an "arrow in the knee" after dozens of Telegram leaks?

One source between various others with a bit more info on the tech side: "Telegram voicemail hack used towards Brazil’s president, ministers"[0]

[0] https://ethhack.com/2019/07/telegram-voicemail-hack-used-aga...

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Technically, that wasn't a Telegram issue. Telegram supports 2FA with an user-configured password. Dallagnol & co weren't using it. They were thus vulnerable to voice mail hijacking, SMS hijacking, and other carrier-based attacks.

I agree Telegram's UX could be better but the app isn't to blame if technologically illiterate users are relying on it to circulate high profile confidential info.

"In keeping with courtroom paperwork, the 4 used a comparatively unknown hacking trick to bind the victims’ Telegram accounts to their telephones.

Native media reported that the hackers used entry to the accounts to ship spam messages with malicious hyperlinks to customers’ contacts."

Good ol' phishing.

True, but you can imagine how mainstream media reports those. They put everything in a pot labeled "hack" and push it forward.

One thing they (mainstream media) failed to mention is they were indeed victims of sim-jacking as well, if ever by simple link phishing. That was througly described by the victims themselves at Congress investigative sessions.

Sadly, in Brazil the current mainstream media is mostly biased towards the previous government and all the people that was arrested by the Car Wash Operation. They won't openly say it ever (in here they're not as transparent as US ones, for example - and the Operation is probably one of the most popular events ever in the country's history), but the ones at mainstream media that won their place last 20 years' government just want their corrupt politicians back in power.

To say the victims there were hacked because they clicked suspicious links by their own will it's not only convenient, but what they actually want the broad population to believe.

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