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Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#161

Post by tomjen3 »

funnym0nk3y wrote: post #29
traspler wrote: post #4

Is there anything special going on in Germany atm to prompt this? I‘m slighlty confused why they would do such a poll…

Telegram is considered a platform for people, which do not respect the basic values of democracy like groups far right expressing xenophobia and groups which think (and express loudly) of the COVID measures as repression by some elite against the common citizen. Most of them whish for a autoritarian government. Groups which act against the constitution are observed by the Verfassungsschutz, an authority to protect th…

Yes Telegram is being smeared pretty badly in the German press, but to even consider people who have a disagreement with _huge_ cuts into personal liberty as a threat to basic democracy means that nobody should take them seriously.

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#162

Post by NayamAmarshe »

khannurien wrote: post #86
onli wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can install Telegram with f-droid, and it works well on a degoogled phone. Signal forbids alternate clients and is not on f-droid. It's thus just not an option.

https://signal.org/android/apk/ Signal will send you a notification when updates are available, and self-update.

So will Telegram but at least they're not hostile towards F-Droid like Moxie.

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#163

Post by tcfhgj »

dark-star wrote: post #133
tcfhgj wrote: post #112

I don't think I was asked despite having a German IP and phone number

did you scroll up in the "Telegram" (service-notification) channel? The poll is in there

I scrolled up to 2016 - then it ends

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#164

Post by NayamAmarshe »

bigbacaloa wrote: post #69

The categorical statement "Telegram never shares information about your chats or contacts with third parties, including government agencies" is simply dishonest. The word "never" is incorrect.

They don't. When they do, they only share IP Address and Phone number and only when it's a court order. Even FBI's leaked document confirmed this.

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#165

Post by Canada »

upofadown wrote: post #81
izzytcp wrote: post #3

Hi, German here. How about not storing any information at all? Nothing to give, problem solved. Just like Signal. I seriously don’t understand why people use Telegram instead of Signal. Any reason! The app doesn’t solve any privacy problem, default chats are unencrypted, keeps personal info. App should be dead already or turned into a dating app because it’s clearly not seriously privacy fucused.

>How about not storing any information at all? That wouldn't work for groups. Abusers could then destroy the groups with impunity for the purpose of censorship. Telegram is mostly about groups. Telegram is often used for activism. Signal claims to not store data about who is talking to who. That doesn't mean that they don't. If they were, say, a secret subsidiary of the CIA they would act exactly as they are acting n…

The signal code is public and has been widely reviewed. We know full well what the server knows regardless of what they say.

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#166

Post by maxnoe »

tommit wrote: post #138
tcfhgj wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get why anyone uses Signal. Horrible UX compared to WhatsApp, no sync of messages between devices, walled garden like WhatsApp, you can't have your own custom client only thing: not Facebook & open source You can have all of that with a Matrix client (except good UX, that's unique to Telegram)

I'm not sure what you mean. Messages sync just fine between my iPhone and Linux machine. > Horrible UX It got way better in the past few years. When I did the initial push with my friends, we failed. Mainly because the basic functionality was buggy at times, such as messages that would simply not be received. But now it's running real smooth imo. Sure, there are a few things I would like to see. Polls is a big one. M…

No they don't sync just fine. A device cannot receive chat history from before it was added and signal regularly "forgets" linked devices, losing all messages on the device and starting from scratch after relinking.

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#167

Post by AnonC »

izzytcp wrote: post #3

Hi, German here. How about not storing any information at all? Nothing to give, problem solved. Just like Signal. I seriously don’t understand why people use Telegram instead of Signal. Any reason! The app doesn’t solve any privacy problem, default chats are unencrypted, keeps personal info. App should be dead already or turned into a dating app because it’s clearly not seriously privacy fucused.

> I seriously don’t understand why people use Telegram instead of Signal. Any reason!

Any reason? I’ll give you some serious ones.

Signal sucks really bad on user experience and features. If you try both for a week or two and learn about the features, you’d be able to conclude the same.

Signal does not care about users and prevents backups on iOS. Lose your device or delete the app due to some issues and reinstall? All your chats are gone!

Signal still has message delivery issues (like long delays)…it’s 2022!!!

Signal keeps pestering me to allow notifications and to allow contacts access. I can only choose “Not Now”, since there is no option that says “No”. When I choose “Not Now”, it will say “we’ll remind you later” and pester me again. I don’t understand why anyone would assume that this app cares about privacy or about users’ time.

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#168

Post by sazz »

funnym0nk3y wrote: post #29
traspler wrote: post #4

Is there anything special going on in Germany atm to prompt this? I‘m slighlty confused why they would do such a poll…

Telegram is considered a platform for people, which do not respect the basic values of democracy like groups far right expressing xenophobia and groups which think (and express loudly) of the COVID measures as repression by some elite against the common citizen. Most of them whish for a autoritarian government. Groups which act against the constitution are observed by the Verfassungsschutz, an authority to protect th…

"basic values of democracy" was redefined by Nancy Fraeser, Home Secretary. According to her only those people who align with the values of government are democrats.

https://www.cicero.de/innenpolitik/nancy-faeser-und-kommende...

So she's basically considering every upcoming protest against government due to exorbitant high energy price being anti-constitutional and undermined by violent right-wing extremists.

This is not somy dystopian future, this is Germany 2022.

"Telegram: An important opposition tool abroad, a radicalising cesspit at home."

https://twitter.com/argonerd/status/1296552428620451842?lang...

Re: Telegram is asking German users when to share information with law enforcement

#169

Post by hunter2_ »

Canada wrote: post #165
upofadown wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How about not storing any information at all? That wouldn't work for groups. Abusers could then destroy the groups with impunity for the purpose of censorship. Telegram is mostly about groups. Telegram is often used for activism. Signal claims to not store data about who is talking to who. That doesn't mean that they don't. If they were, say, a secret subsidiary of the CIA they would act exactly as they are acting n…

The signal code is public and has been widely reviewed. We know full well what the server knows regardless of what they say.

Suppose an update is rolled out in app stores, and many people update to it. Suppose this new version contains surveillance instead of matching the published/reviewed code. Won't there be some substantial period of time during which many messages can be stolen before somebody eventually goes on twitter to say "hmm, wireshark shows more data than I'd expect" and/or "hmm, I can't get the source to build quite like the store's new apk"?
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