On Sky News UK today:

“Vladmir Putin took steps to shut down Telegram when it first appeared in Russia...”

“But in 2018 the Kremlin suddenly ended its pursuit of Telegram, where it is now one of Russia's most popular social media apps - even with the Russian military. A leading Russian pro-war blogger joked after Durov's arrest: "De-facto they detained the head of communications for the Russian Army".”

“A rival encrypted messaging app Signal, whose servers, unlike many of Telegram's are not hosted in Russia, was recently banned there.”

🤔

news.sky.com/story/pavel-durov…

Pavel Durov's arrest, much like the Telegram app, works to Russia's advantage

France has denied the arrest of Durov was politically motivated - but either way it allows Moscow to accuse the French government of an attack on free speech.

^{Tom Clarke (Sky News)}

@blausand
For the moment it might not be quite the challenge, because Signal just set up their system smarter than Telegram did, from what I remember.

Signal's legal strategy when it comes to government requests is to first fight it tooth and nail, but when they eventually have to cooperate, they do, via "ah well, there you go, take this bit of nothing". It's a consequence of their messenger design, but it means they are legally cooperative when required, and they have designed…

@blausand
… their messenger accordingly, knowing they have to, which is a smart move.

Telegram's legal strategy, from what I remember, seemed to be to just plainly ignore any government requests, the consequence of which might just have happened to Durov now.

So I think Signal has already a pretty smart response to legislatory forces.

Of course there could always be a more authoritarian environment, but that would require a very straightforward mask-off approach in legislation. …

@blausand
… While we shouldn't get complacent, I am carefully optimistic that we might manage to steer clear of any obvious legal constructs forcing more invasive measures from communications providers.

But the legal requirement of moderation has been there forever, and Telegram's design is such that it would in principal be possible. Telegram just ignoring anything in that regard might not have been the smartest approach.

That's of course just my superficial read on the situation.

@cherti I feel it's worse. Telegram is a mostly unmoderated social network that is purposefully masquerading as and pretending to be an encrypted IM.

What this means is that its users are tricked into a false sense of security and thus put in harms way.

And it also means that the actually secure, encrypted IM services, like Signal, become tagged with Telegram's failings.

Pretty obnoxious if you ask me. But hey, how would Durov get a private plane otherwise, right?

@blausand

the whole point of this piece is that:

1. Telegram bills itself as "encrypted IM" (which it is not)

2. Telegram constantly compares itself to Signal on security and privacy, claiming Signal is less secure and private (which is also false).

I do believe it's fair game to take Telegram tot ask on this.

If Telegram wants to not be compared unfavourably to Signal on secure IM features, it is welcome to stop comparing itself to Signal on secure IM features. 🤷‍♀️

I am sure you asked very similar questions of Telegram's and Durov's social network accounts when they were misrepresenting Signal.

After all, I am merely *representing* Telegram, while Telegram was outright *misrepresenting* Signal.

I would not dare to imagine you not having enough integrity to do so. So I am eager to hear what they had to say to your valid points. Care to link to the thread?

@kkarhan I consider a service that actively, relentlessly misrepresents its security and encryption stance way worse and more harmful than a service that does not.

@signalapp @torproject

Agreed.

Tho I'd say that @signalapp is just marginally less shit in execution AFAICT, not in concept tho...

@kkarhan I have criticized @signalapp publicly for a bunch of things.

But saying that Signal is "marginally" better than Telegram is simply wrong. Signal is leaps and bounds better than Telegram, in execution and in concept.

Telegram's concept is "let's implement just enough e2ee to be able to lie our way into pretending we're an e2ee IM, while being nothing of the sort."

They do this *on purpose*, knowing this puts people in harm's way.

Making any sort of equivalence here is not justified.