Telegram’s policy change will change the way the popular messaging app works forever. The notification on the official channel ensures that they hand over the IP addresses and phone numbers of their users to the authorities in an effort to control criminal activity on the platform. It should be emphasized that the transfer of data must take place with guarantees, i.e. in response to applicable legal requirements.

In accordance with these changes, the company explicitly states on its privacy policy page: «If Telegram receives a valid warrant from the relevant judicial authorities confirming that you are a suspect in a case involving criminal activity that violates the Telegram Terms of Service, we will conduct a legal analysis of the request and may disclose your IP address and phone number to the relevant authorities.

It is worth noting that this policy change in Telegram is very important, as previous versions of this policy limited the sharing of user information to cases involving terrorism suspects. and nothing more.

There are other important changes. Data disclosure will be included in regular transparency reports, and the service may collect metadata such as IP address, device, Telegram applications used, and username change history. Address spam, abuse and even more serious violations.

Is this Telegram policy change a problem?

It’s no secret that all these changes (like the one we saw in the content report) are happening after the arrest of Pavel Durov, the founder and CEO of Telegram in France, currently free.

But is it negative? No, for the vast majority of people. “Normal” people, if you’ll allow the expression. The balance between freedom of expression and information, privacy and respect for others has never been easy, but in the era of connectivity and social networks, it is becoming an impossible mission.

Like all social networks, Telegram is full of people, and its owners have devoted themselves to business rather than moderating and controlling illegal activities. Pavel Durov is accused of this, do nothing (or very little) to prevent the platform’s main threatshate and/or disinformation campaigns targeting pedophiles, including money laundering, drug trafficking, software piracy and more.

But there are many more of us who are ‘normal’ and respect the rules and people. We love Telegram and in fact use it professionally to bring you feeds from our six portals, from MC to MCPRO and of course verylinux where we started. We defended the platform when it included absolutely disproportionate measures, but France’s lawsuit against Telegram is justified and changes in the usage policies are necessary, even if they concern privacy.