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Comment by harryf | Hacker News Reader

> Platforms like Signal can get away with this because they are properly E2E encrypted, and cannot identify illegal content.

Signal isn't magically protected by proper E2E encryption. When the time comes to take them down legally, all that's needed is evidence from end users phones demonstrating illegal activities occurring over Signal. But - for now - Signal seems to have better friends and or be upsetting less authorities than Telegram.

To me it's pretty clear reason why they've gone after Telegram is the Channels and Groups. Seen from a certain perspective Telegram channels are an alternative to Reddit, and have been popular medium during COVID and the Ukraine war for "alternative news". By now Reddit is properly controlled and subdued but Telegram isn't.

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> all that's needed is evidence from end users phones demonstrating illegal activities occurring over Signal

No, that's non sense. It is perfectly legal to operate a E2E encrypted platform in the EU.

What would be illegal is for Signal to refuse to answer when asked for information by the justice system. As long as they are cooperative and provide what they can - even if it's not much - everything is alright.

Didn't Signal threaten to leave the EU recently over concerns of what it would mean to "cooperate" in a regime of client-side scanning of content?

>To me it's pretty clear reason why they've gone after Telegram is the Channels and Groups. Seen from a certain perspective Telegram channels are an alternative to Reddit, and have been popular medium during COVID and the Ukraine war for "alternative news". By now Reddit is properly controlled and subdued but Telegram isn't.

This is full on speculation. Right now the reality is you can buy underage people, drugs and weapons on telegram. ISIS recruitment channels, etc.

Playing the "free speech" card is disingenuous.

Telegram regularly bans channels that promote hate-speech or do illegal activities.

The only issue is, their team is way too small for moderation, which is why so many weird communities keep popping up.

I’ve been on Telegram for 5 years and I’ve yet to see anything of what you mentioned in your comment.

It’s a fear mongering tactic against a perfectly good and arguably the best messenger application in existence right now.

I have seen it constantly. IDK why, but so sometimes I got just invited into such groups.

When I activated the function to find people around me, most of the time I was spending in Telegram was leaving and reporting such groups.

Some of the channels, even discoverable by simple search, were years old.

"Arguably" Element is way better than Telegram, it actually properly encrypts private chats AND allows sync between devices

Would it be bad for AI to start moderating / flagging speech? Seems like it could vastly extend the range of human moderators and also spare humans from directly scrutinizing harmful graphic content. Big Robot Brother reminds me of the anime Psycho-Pass.

> This is full on speculation.

Speculation is a crucial part of decision-making, especially in geopolitics, where hard data is often scarce. Governments frequently act on leading indicators to preempt potential threats, whether it's about national security or information control. Dismissing this as "pure speculation" overlooks how critical decisions are made in complex, rapidly evolving situations.

> Playing the "free speech" card is disingenuous.

This isn't about free speech; it's about narrative control, especially with the upcoming U.S. election. Controlling platforms like Telegram and TikTok is crucial for influencing public discourse. Recent U.S. regulations targeting TikTok further highlight how critical it is for governments to manage the flow of information as elections approach.

And somehow everyone noticed these issues a few weeks after Russia banned Signal, and not until then.

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