Russian Government Bans Telegram App After Denial of Access to User Messages
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MOSCOW (Reuters) - A Russian court on Friday ordered that access to the Telegram messenger service should be blocked in Russia, Russian news agencies reported, heralding communication disruption for scores of users - including government officials.
The decision came a week after Russia’s state communication watchdog filed a lawsuit to limit access to Telegram messaging app following the company’s refusal to give Russian state security services access to its users messages.
With more than 200 million users worldwide, the mobile messaging app allows users to communicate via encrypted messages which cannot be read by third parties, including government authorities.
The Kremlin uses Telegram to coordinate timings of regular conference calls with Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, while many government officials use the messenger to communicate with media.
Telegram became the second global network after LinkedIn to be blocked in Russia. LinkedIn was blocked in 2016 when a court found the firm guilty of violating a law that requires companies holding Russian citizens’ data to store it on servers on Russian soil.
Russian court bans access to Telegram messenger | Reuters
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:thinking:
So what I’m hearing here is that sensitive Kremlin data is held by Telegram wherever Telegram is located…
Worth mentioning:
One of Telegram founders is guy named Pavel Durov.
Pavel Durov founded Russian social network - Vkontakte.
In 2014 - He made joke about resigning as well as refused to hand over personal details of VK users who were out to Protest in Ukraine. so later somehow magically VK ended up being under control of Mail.ru Group (Public Corporation, probably/most likely tied to Putin),
Pavel Durov basically fled Russia and established Telegram as American and English non profit organizations.
So it's kinda hilarious how Russian government would even think they would get anything from Telegram other than a massive fuck you.
Oh boy i can't wait to download illegal apk file through illegal TOR browser and to store it in my giant library of illegaly downloaded movies....
CAN GOVERMAN STOPH MEH?
There's basically nothing stopping users from using other end-to-end encryption apps like whatsapp, right?
If they're p2p, no. Whatsapp isn't p2p so it can be blocked.
"The Kremlin uses Telegram to coordinate timings of regular conference calls with Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, while many government officials use the messenger to communicate with media."
This is goddamn hilarious to me. Do you think they use furry sticker packs when messaging eachother? First we learn that Russians run furry propaganda Tumblr pages, and now we learn that they also likely are in group furry telegram chats with one another. Russia might be fucking us up from the inside with political scandals, but we're destroying Russia from the inside out with the spread of furry culture. From the ashes of our own damnation, we shall rise like phoenix fursonas and destroy the reds, hallelujuah.
Russia seems to have a hilariously bad history with collateral. Terrorists in a school / public building with hostages? Gas it! (I know the gas bit was partially an accident) Use an airstrike!
More like run thro uh gh the wall with an APC.
They just blocked fuckton of internet services, causing incredible problem for retail stores, clinics and everything else.
And tele works thanks to internal vpn bypass.
Wonder if they end up blocking goverment affiliated sites by accident.
Idiotic