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Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

wired.com

241–250 of 257 posts

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#241

People are consistently surprised that Telegram is not encrypted by default in any setting. You have to create a device-to-device-specific encrypted chat with your counter-party. It's not a reasonable security model, vastly outclassed by (the still quite flawed) Signal. Ultimately, we need encrypted-by-default messaging based on public/private key pairs (obscured from the uninterested user, of course).

If I'll ever need an app to pass around Pentagon secrets, I'll surely use Signal or something better. But if I need an app to chat with my friends and discuss what's going on without being banned and having the daily dose of Mandatory Truth injected, then Telegram works just fine so far.

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#243
The frequency with which Wired obsessively brings up Trump into everything suggests they are much less interested in exploring the technical side than to push a political agenda. It makes it look like the only thing that matters is where Trump is tweeting now.

And of course, at the conclusion of the article, the author shudders of the thought that there could be a communication platform not censored by the government. The horror!

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#244
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what ultimately matters is how people actually use it, and that is probably in an unencrypted manner I've heard criticisms about Telegram's MTProto encryption on HN, but in my usage of Telegram nobody has ever turned on the secret chats mode enabling it anyway. Anyone privacy-conscious asks me to use Signal, Matrix, or even Threema. I have heard compliments about Telegram sticker packs though, if the other apps wan…

I don't think I've ever seen any of the stickers from the telegram company actually used in a chat. I've seen lots of stickers that people have had drawn, though, sometimes even used by the people who commissioned them.

Telegram puts out a lot of packs, but they're made by different artists. You may be using their packs without realizing it. Everything on the Trending tab is theirs, and it changes frequently. Here are three packs with bats that I use, all commissioned by the Telegram team.

https://tlgrm.eu/stickers/MrBat https://tlgrm.eu/stickers/BattyBat https://tlgrm.eu/stickers/FangBat

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#245
post #176

The "sad thing" is that Whatsapp is 10x-50x more popular in my country and its quite hard to integrate (APIs, bots) compared to Telegram, at least for "small business". I wonder if Telegram would also be more closed if it was #1...

WhatsApp recently launched hosted API [1] for faster and easier integration for small business [1] https://techcrunch.com/2021/11/01/whatsapp-brings-its-busine...

I think its the same thing [1], but applied anyway with my 1-one company.

[1] https://faq.whatsapp.com/general/whatsapp-business-api/getti...

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but it’s for some reason framed as a WhatsApp competitor even in countries where Facebook Messenger is relatively popular, which seems silly to me. It appears to fill a similar feature niche as Facebook Messenger, not WhatsApp, even if these two categories can be somewhat conflated for most uses.

Yeah, the irony is they position themselves as 'anti-facebook' and they're worse for the user than FB's whatsapp product from a security standpoint. I'd probably even trust FB's unencrypted messenger content to be better protected than telegram. They clearly have a loyal fan following though.

I absolutely don't recommend using Telegram for sensitive communications.

That said, this idea

> I'd probably even trust FB's unencrypted messenger content to be better protected than telegram.

is ridiculous.

With Facebook you know you will be datamined and the result sold to anyone who wants to buy..

With Telegram maybe Putin reads it, maybe not.

One of them is a threat to my family and friends, the other is not.

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#247
post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole Jan 6 thing is a complete joke. Many people outside the USA can not even understand why this is still a thing people talk about, compare it to terrorism and even to the 9/11 attacks. Its completely insane. I remember 9/11 from outside USA. It "broke" the normal way people lived their life. Jan 6 on the other hand did nothing, no one cared. Only US propaganda media made a huge deal out of it. And they keep t…

That's because Jan 6 turned into a failed, and very incompetently executed attempt at a coup. 9/11 may have been devastating in many ways, but Jan 6 was an attack at the very structure of the American democracy. They tried to install a leader of the country who wasn't actually the one elected by the majority. If they succeeded, it would be a major blow to American credibility and founding story of a "democratic natio…

> That's because Jan 6 turned into a failed, and very incompetently executed attempt at a coup.

You gotta be kidding me and/or yourself. Do you really believable that?

This was a rather normal protest march which escalated to a riot where a small fraction of the people probably 100-200 resorted to various forms of violence mostly against property and to an extend against police. No question this is bad. But a coup? Really? Installing a leader, lol what?

Reality check: If an heavy armed group would have stormed the capitols and killed everyone inside that would not have installed a leader and that would be an actual terrorist act. Still there is no logical path how that would/could have changed whos the next president.

There is no evidence that any group of people went there with this goal (to violently install a leader). The vast majority was just there to protest and didn't do anything wrong. From the 700+ people charged the majority was just foolish and entered the building/property after police gave up or where overpowered by the actual violent people. There are plenty videos from inside the capitol where people just walk around. These videos were used to charge them but given the fact that they just walk around they basically are trespassing and cant be charged for much. Most of the 700+ charges are non-violent.

One person died because she was shot by the police some others died do to medial reasons. Some injuries and property damage as you would expect from a riot. Calling this a coup is absurd. America would be the last place where people start a coup unarmed.

I would advice you to watch some of the live streams from that day and/or read some foreign news articles about it and make sure you know about all the debunked misinformation tied to the riot. From X people who got killed to a police officer being murdered to bombs it really had it all and most old articles you find about it still are not corrected.

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the irony is they position themselves as 'anti-facebook' and they're worse for the user than FB's whatsapp product from a security standpoint. I'd probably even trust FB's unencrypted messenger content to be better protected than telegram. They clearly have a loyal fan following though.

I absolutely don't recommend using Telegram for sensitive communications. That said, this idea > I'd probably even trust FB's unencrypted messenger content to be better protected than telegram. is ridiculous. With Facebook you know you will be datamined and the result sold to anyone who wants to buy.. With Telegram maybe Putin reads it, maybe not. One of them is a threat to my family and friends, the other is not.

FB doesn't sell the data, they sell the ability for advertisers to advertise to groups. I'm not a fan of ad-driven models, but this is a lot different than selling data.

If you're using unencrypted messaging you should assume it's public. This is true of FB messenger and Telegram, but if I had to bet on what unencrypted content is more likely to be owned I'd bet on Telegram. This is mostly a bet on where the world's best security people are and the company culture.

Really though we shouldn't be relying on the benevolence of any of these company leaders, that's why people should use Signal or WhatsApp where the encryption means you don't have to (or Urbit where there is no central leader).

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the irony is they position themselves as 'anti-facebook' and they're worse for the user than FB's whatsapp product from a security standpoint. I'd probably even trust FB's unencrypted messenger content to be better protected than telegram. They clearly have a loyal fan following though.

I absolutely don't recommend using Telegram for sensitive communications. That said, this idea > I'd probably even trust FB's unencrypted messenger content to be better protected than telegram. is ridiculous. With Facebook you know you will be datamined and the result sold to anyone who wants to buy.. With Telegram maybe Putin reads it, maybe not. One of them is a threat to my family and friends, the other is not.

Telegram, specifically P. Durov has literally sponsored Russian dissidents. He refused to give over info when he still ran VK over to the FSB instead sending them literally memes. When Telegram was banned in Russia, he spun up free proxies for people to bypass the restrictions.

In short - you’re posting misinformation.

Re: Telegram Became the Anti-Facebook

#250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I absolutely don't recommend using Telegram for sensitive communications. That said, this idea > I'd probably even trust FB's unencrypted messenger content to be better protected than telegram. is ridiculous. With Facebook you know you will be datamined and the result sold to anyone who wants to buy.. With Telegram maybe Putin reads it, maybe not. One of them is a threat to my family and friends, the other is not.

Telegram, specifically P. Durov has literally sponsored Russian dissidents. He refused to give over info when he still ran VK over to the FSB instead sending them literally memes. When Telegram was banned in Russia, he spun up free proxies for people to bypass the restrictions. In short - you’re posting misinformation.

That is not intentional.

My point is not that Durov sends data to Putin (I don't think he does).

My point is that there is a lot we don't know about Telegram.

When it comes to WhatsApp and all other Facebook properties we know a lot and much of what we know is ugly.

But yes, I should find a better way to phrase it.

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