Telegram users have never had privacy. Group chats are completely in the open and private messages are only encrypted if both users turn it on for each conversation—and it’s off by default. I’ve never understood why anyone thinks Telegram is any better than posting anywhere else on the internet.
On a privacy note in general, I got an email from Proton today saying that they were changing their terms of service and I actually care enough about the service that I went and read the new terms and privacy policies for the products that I use. I will admit to not understanding a lot of the legal ease, but the part I was most interested in was the data retention policies and data encryption. And that all seems to be pretty bulletproof from a tech angle.
All this talk of encryption and sopenas is mostly pointless - all the police need to do is join any of the Telegram channels and see the evidence for themselves, like in this case - https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350438242/man-who-wanted-build-gallows-hear-jacinda-arderns-neck-snap-guilty-threats-kill
No doubt there are private channels but there’s absolutely no shortage of criminal stuff happening out in the open.
That’s what subpoenas are for, to request the ip address and other identifying information are for. The documentation of activity in the channel is the evidence shown to a judge that then gets the official legal request.
Half of them use their real name. Also a lot of them are sharing links to content they’ve posted using their personal FB account or whatever. They don’t even try to have any opsec because they don’t think they’re doing anything wrong.
My younger sister (Gen Z) talks smack about my generation (millennial) overuse of emojis and this Telegram post is making me agree with her. The attempt at cutesie emojis is jarring.
