Telegram may get banned in India.

Mr.J said:

It's funny no one has taken this comment seriously and have started ranting about freedom of speech etc.

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Because its obviously western biased.

West safe harbour (check)
Russia bad (check)

The freedom of speech thing is true as the French pride themselves on having the most liberal (for Europe) speech laws. Anything not expressly prohibited is allowed dating back to the late 19th c.

The French also pride themselves as independent minded and different from those anglo saxons. This attitude was stronger in the past than it is today no doubt.

So they had to swallow all their pride and act on whose behest.

Mr.J said:

Durov was given French citizenship in 2021. The warrant against Durov was issued in March 2024. And he still flew to France.

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Only to refuel his plane. Some one must have tipped off the French authorities he was arriving and to detain him like Huawei founders daughter getting pinched landing in Canada style. Take a wild guess who that party could be.

Mr.J said:

There's no way this isn't case of defection. He's most likely going to chill in French prison till the situation in Ukraine is resolved.

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Now you're getting warmer. The best source for pro-war ie. Russian biased news is Telegram. A good counter to the gaslighting nonsense you read in western media about that conflict.

Once again which party would like this source of news closed or otherwise hindered?

Mr.J said:

‘Russians do everything via Telegram.’ Pavel Durov’s arrest upends Kremlin military comms.

Although Durov publicly distances himself from Moscow, his platform has become vital for Russian army coordination in Ukraine.

www.politico.eu

Telegram founder’s arrest could have far-reaching impact on Russia

Response across political spectrum to Pavel Durov’s arrest highlights unique place messaging app has in Russian society

www.theguardian.com

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Tiktok not western controlled bad (check)
Telegram not western controlled bad (check)

Mr.J said:

It's funny no one has taken this comment seriously and have started ranting about freedom of speech etc.

Durov was given French citizenship in 2021. The warrant against Durov was issued in March 2024. And he still flew to France.

There's no way this isn't case of defection. He's most likely going to chill in French prison till the situation in Ukraine is resolved.

‘Russians do everything via Telegram.’ Pavel Durov’s arrest upends Kremlin military comms.

Although Durov publicly distances himself from Moscow, his platform has become vital for Russian army coordination in Ukraine.

www.politico.eu

Telegram founder’s arrest could have far-reaching impact on Russia

Response across political spectrum to Pavel Durov’s arrest highlights unique place messaging app has in Russian society

www.theguardian.com

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While this is all because Telegram is not controlled by the west there is one important point, as best as I can tell there is no place on earth you can be safe from the KGB (formerly) and (currently) its successor(s). The same goes for Mossad. The CIA is good, behind a desk, and a satellite. A spy plane in the old days.

guest_999 said:

CIA & FBI don't have free time to waste on "censor" when there is always some terrorist/lunatic planning an attack sitting in their home.

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You do realise that they did exactly that for years, right? Twitter files made everything public and it's now known that FBI, etc decided which things were allowed to be posted and what narratives to construct. Even zuck recently expressed regret about Meta working with them. There are public statements and court lawsuits yet people still say "Do you really believe FBI wastes time censoring social media??"

guest_999 said:

CIA & FBI don't have free time to waste on "censor" when there is always some terrorist/lunatic planning an attack sitting in their home.

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Terrorism, then looking for spies and finally nuclear proliferators. That's about all they have bandwidth for.

bhp91 said:

You do realise that they did exactly that for years, right? Twitter files made everything public and it's now known that FBI, etc decided which things were allowed to be posted and what narratives to construct. Even zuck recently expressed regret about Meta working with them. There are public statements and court lawsuits yet people still say "Do you really believe FBI wastes time censoring social media??"

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You might find this earlier post of mine is what you are referring to. Its not the CIA/ FBI but the US military (!) and i can only see this kind of censorship developing further because of replacement theory.

The country where Telegram is officially based have suspended deal to buy fighter jets from France. And thus shown their interest in the case.

blr_p said:

Terrorism, then looking for spies and finally nuclear proliferators. That's about all they have bandwidth for.

You might find this earlier post of mine is what you are referring to. Its not the CIA/ FBI but the US military (!) and i can only see this kind of censorship developing further because of replacement theory.

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@blr_p

bhp91 said:

You do realise that they did exactly that for years, right? Twitter files made everything public and it's now known that FBI, etc decided which things were allowed to be posted and what narratives to construct. Even zuck recently expressed regret about Meta working with them.

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You also do realise that it is CIA/FBI job to thwart potential foreign plots/interference in sensitive national matters while following the policy "better safe than sorry". So if some online posts/propaganda looks like Russian/Chinese/... then FBI/CIA can't let it go else they would be roasted in the senate/congress hearing committees later but if they are proved wrong then they can always say "nothing is 100% guaranteed in spy world anyway". Neither Zuch nor Musk care about people in general if that's what you are thinking, they only care about having the supreme authority to run their platforms in whatever way they want just like kingdoms in earlier times & their ego gets hurt when a bureaucrat earning not even a fraction of their daily income can make them follow "rules".

I suppose what i was referring to could be considered covered in part 8


Don't remember mike benz mentioning these twitter files though

Benz gave another interview to tucker on this topic. Starts 1:20

altair21 said:

officially, the reason is telegram is supporting money laundering/drugs etc, unofficially, its because the French govt is pissed they dont have the same backdoor access to Telegram like US or Russia

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I've been wondering about this and i have two sources that say the US does not have backdoor access to telegram.

- Guardian mentions it in an article
- mike benz above as well

So why did the US like telegram? Because it allows to bypass state controls in countries of interest for them by enabling resistance & political movements to coordinate better. Free speech helps topple authoritarian governments

Why does the US seem to be changing its mind? Because its a doubled edged sword

Why do the Russians like telegram? Because it helps them counter the US in Ukraine. Exactly why the US has a problem with it. Not clear to me the Russians have backdoor acces either but the US was using it against Russia to organise internal resistance.

50% of Russians are on telegram. The Russian military has no problem with it. Ergo Russia must have a backdoor? Which the US still does not. The Russians can see what the US and Ukrainians are doing and defeat both.

You will hear ad infintum about Russian involvement in 2016 elections. That was true. Russia did it as a response to the US toppling the Russian friendly Ukrainian government in 2014.

I'm not a fan of this ww3 is upon us narrative. Some say it has already begun. In the information space. Notice the scrambling by various countries to control or moderate what you see or cannot see.

alap4m said:

Those seeking to obtain content of questionable legality, and "much worse stuff", have MANY platforms and ways. They aren't restricted to Telegram.
Platforms like Signal and Matrix too fall in this category. Is anyone going after them? And then there are Millions of websites for such purposes too.
Going after Telegram is futile as it won't stop the flow and consumption of "stuff".

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Have you even used signal or matrix because I doubt it? Crime & criminal world is operated since ancient times but it is when they start operating too openly & on a too large scale that it becomes an issue. Matrix & signal users are not even a fraction of users on TG, WA or even discord. Going after TG is not futile if it means cutting down the scale of illegal stuff just like how torrent websites are still dime a dozen but major ones like rarbg gets shut down regularly every few years.

After listening to that interview with mike benz, the French motivation becomes clear.

The Russians are threatening French interests in Africa. All the recent anti french protests in former African colonies are due to Russian influence.

Niger is where France sources most of the uranium that goes into their nuke electricity plants.

A year ago the Niger government came under the influence of Russia. So France's ability to keep their lights on is an open question.

Anything that will give France leverage against the Russians is needed.

Decadent_Spectre said:

While this is all because Telegram is not controlled by the west there is one important point, as best as I can tell there is no place on earth you can be safe from the KGB (formerly) and (currently) its successor(s).

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Or maybe staying in a French prison is a safer option.

Keeping all conspiracy theories aside, actual evidence has been submitted that Telegram simply ignored all takedown notices with respect to child abuse and several other violent crimes. It ranges back from several months to over a year. You simply can't ignore all legal frameworks in the name of free speech.

This is the reason most organisations have dedicated content safety teams, process to review flagged content as well as DMCA notices.

You cannot keep profiting from user content while taking zero accountability for it when it is your platform that is being used to spread abuse and hatred. Realistically, the same thing should happen to X considering how it is operating under Elmo.

t3chg33k said:

Elmo

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Is it his nickname?

t3chg33k said:

You simply can't ignore all legal frameworks in the name of free speech.

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Telephone companies have been doing just that since the start.

Google, facebook etc have made the case they come under the same protection.

blr_p said:

Telephone companies have been doing just that since the start.

Google, facebook etc have made the case they come under the same protection.

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It's not necessarily the same. I am sure they would have lower protection if there was broadcast happening on their phone lines instead of one to one conversations. Everyone is afraid of the masses learning something that is contrary to their "philosophy".

Darth Vader said:

This will ruin things for everyone other than criminals.

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yup they are sitting in the parliaments across the globe using ultra encrypted mode of communications.

codwapeace said:

It's not necessarily the same. I am sure they would have lower protection if there was broadcast happening on their phone lines instead of one to one conversations. Everyone is afraid of the masses learning something that is contrary to their "philosophy".

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Yet that was Google & Facebook have said. Twitter will also qualify. Why not telegram

blr_p said:

Yet that was Google & Facebook have said. Twitter will also qualify. Why not telegram

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They take stuff down when asked (or sometimes on their own). Apparently, Telegram doesn't. Although, the sequence of events makes it seem like that Durov is taking asylum in the guise of jail.

Really? Seen the American ambassadors twitter feed in France lately. Nothing to see. So why are the Russians protesting? Think again

blr_p said:

Telephone companies have been doing just that since the start.

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Legally approved call recording, legally approved call record details, legally approved sim cancellation for commercially abusing unlimited plans, anything else I missed.

blr_p said:

Google, facebook etc have made the case they come under the same protection.

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Google & FB are far ahead of TG when it comes to following the "common sense rules". Even many pirate websites are ahead of TG in this respect.