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Comment by eznzt | Hacker News Reader

Telegram does not have end-to-end encryption by default and group chats cannot be end-to-end encrypted at all.

You cannot really do this when telegram is available on many devices at the same time. I can use it on 5 devices or even more at the same time. A feature that WhatsApp does not offer. The data is on my phone and maybe (if the backup works for once) in google drive or iCloud.

iMessage pulls this off though, afaik iMessage does this by having the sender encrypt for each recipient device.

Then there is still the issue of storage. With the amount of channels and groups i am in none of my devices would be able to hold everything. While i can just redownload everything from telegram.

First off: Correct. Off all the people trying to say this you are the first I've seen who has nailed it!

That said: Neither is mail.

Mail is still useful for a lot of things.

See also tptaceks take:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22371316

I am not comparing it to mail, I am comparing it to whatsapp.

No, you are not comparing to anything, which is totally fine :-)

I'm comparing it to mail.

And if you want a more secure alternative, please go with Signal.

WhatsApp leaks metadata east and west, and if you or any of the people you talk to enable backups all your chats end up in the cloud with a different company.

So much for bulletproof encryption in that case.

Which is why, as crazy as it may sound, telegram is genuinely less secure than WhatsApp for most people

Telegram has not given any private data to any government. They have been banned (that didn't stop them tho) for this.

Whatsapp backsups are strongly encouraged by the app on a frequent basis. You cannot control the backup settings for your contacts. Therefore almost every group is backed up to google drive. Google has allegedly given this data to the authorities because these chats have leaked in a popular case here in India.

https://www.thenewsminute.com/article/how-ncb-retrieved-what...

https://www.indiatoday.in/technology/news/story/bollywood-wh...

The unfortunate reality is that moving to Telegram is moving to a new Facebook. Yes, they offer a bunch of fancy features, unfortunately it's at the price of true privacy. All your data, for all perpetuity, will be stored on telegram servers where you hope that at no point in the future will they be compromised or forced to rat you out.

This is not a problem that Signal faces as they do not keep any of your data.

They comply with the GDPR. You have the right and ability to both export and delete your data at short notice.

I switched to Telegram long time ago when Putin presented an ultimatum to hand over the private keys to its founder, exiling the founder as a result. He never had any problems or ultimatums with WhatsApp.

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