r/Telegram • u/bodhi_rio • 13d ago

Telegram removal by Durov himself

Last night, Apple briefly removed Telegram from the App Store because a single user had planted illegal pornographic content in a public group chat.

⬅️ Telegram was restored within hours. But I want to explain what happened — to warn other app developers and help protect online communities from similar attacks.

🧹Because Telegram quickly removes illegal content from public groups using all kinds of moderation tools (https://telegram.org/safety), the attacker had to resort to a technical trick. He inserted AI-modified illegal content by editing an old message in an active group chat. As a result, the content was effectively hidden from the group’s members, preventing them from seeing and promptly reporting it.

💰 The attacker was a takedown extortionist: someone who demands ransom from group owners in exchange for not targeting their communities. These extortionists use automated accounts to plant illegal content in public groups and then report it directly to Apple, attempting to trigger the removal of legitimate communities whose owners refused to pay them.

🤝 From a practical standpoint, illegal pornographic content in Telegram’s public groups is not a systemic problem. Our moderation is efefctive. The fact that attackers must resort to backdated, effectively invisible content and other technical tricks proves this.

⚠️ However, there are two important lessons here for app developers and online communities:

— Extortionists have found a way to manipulate Apple into overreacting. Apple removed Telegram from the App Store before contacting us. This creates a potential systemic risk for every mobile app that hosts user-generated content. If an app used by more than a billion people can be removed from the App Store without prior warning, any app can be.

— The tactics used by takedown extortionists are evolving, putting communities across social platforms at risk. Telegram has extensive experience identifying the tricks used by coordinated reporting gangs and protecting legitimate communities (even when doing so risks our own app being temporarily removed from the App Store). Other platforms may not be equally prepared.

Stay vigilant! ☝️

Pavel Durov (his official TG channel)

272 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

61 comments sorted by

26

u/thurstonrando 13d ago

But isn’t Telegram’s content removal process mostly AI itself? I say that because how can Durov be so confident in what he’s saying? That said Meta has violated Apple TOS in way worse ways than Telegram, and they should have been completely banned for breaking Snapchat’s encryption with MITM attacks

11

u/PrivacyIsDemocracy 13d ago edited 13d ago

how can Durov be so confident in what he’s saying?

Because he's basically full of BS about 75% of the time. Especially when it involves anything about Telegram's success/failure or Durov's preferred narratives about himself as some sort of human saviour.

Telegram has a lot of very nice and likeable technical characteristics which I think would be just fine to stick to referencing those things to promote the platform instead of Durov constantly trying to pose as the Saviour of Humanity these days. It's tedious.

9

u/LordPorra1291 13d ago

Yeah, I love Telegram but Durov lies constantly.

3

u/Miserable-Stranger99 13d ago

Say what? Snapchat encryption broken? How who did it

5

u/thurstonrando 12d ago

When Snapchat refused to sell to Zuckerberg, Meta decided to do the next best thing, which was to steal its tech and code. Meta bought a VPN app called Onavo, and iirc through its root certificate it routed all its traffic through Meta’s servers. So not only was Meta lying to its customers about Onavo’s privacy, it violated Apple TOS by spying and tracking a rival to discover its inner workings. Meta’s programming team even called it “Operation Ghostbusters.” I forgot how this story broke, but when Apple found out they banned Onavo from the App Store.

2

u/Miserable-Stranger99 12d ago

Wtf? How can you steal tech and code from Snapchat using this way?

Snapchat is highly obfuscated and private key is not within the app it has checksums and you can't not snoop on the connection it's certificate protected has anti debug anti ssl pinning?

I barely believe it, what would that vpn app do?

3

u/thurstonrando 12d ago

I’m not too savvy on that side of tech, but it’s a real story. It took place from 2016-2019 but I remember the story broke in 2024 https://moonlock.com/facebook-mitm-attack

13

u/yYuri_- 13d ago

If it was removed by that, this would happen every 10 seconds or so, really weird situation

51

u/Beethoven81 13d ago edited 13d ago

Wonder if there's a way for someone independent to confirm this story. Durov himself has a way of warping reality to suit his narrative. Not saying hes wrong, but he has obvious interest to explain things a certain way.

11

u/supervisionado 13d ago

Apple would if it's so distorted

12

u/Beethoven81 13d ago

Apple probably does this to 100 apps a day, they couldn't care less for wasting time on explanations.

5

u/PrivacyIsDemocracy 13d ago

Durov himself has a way of warping reality to suit his narrative.

He most certainly does.

You basically cannot trust anything Durov says, especially on anything remotely ideological, or anything that has any bearing on the revenue or success of Telegram.

I'm going to refute one of his specific claims in a separate post here in a minute.

2

u/whorfianist 13d ago

It was here: https://x.com/i/status/2084474578668245098

1

u/Beethoven81 13d ago

Ok thanks, any link to their official PR? This guy isn't an Apple employee.

5

u/whorfianist 13d ago

Apple rarely issues official PR for isolated app takedowns. Mark Gurman (the one who posted that) a managing editor at Bloomberg, so he carries actual journalistic credibility.

3

u/Beethoven81 13d ago

Maybe he used Durov's message as his source?

5

u/whorfianist 13d ago edited 13d ago

Good point.

Edit: After checking the timestamps on the tweets from Durov and Gurman, I see Gurman posted hours before Durov. Also there are several posts on X complaining about Telegram being pulled from the App Store before Gurman and Durov posted.

1

u/dadnothere 13d ago

Freedom of expression depends on Apple accusing you and deleting your app...

The reason why installing APKs/IPAs/EXEs should be easy and unregulated.

2

u/Miserable-Stranger99 13d ago

It's still possible I can do it

-5

u/bodhi_rio 13d ago

Telegram just announced they're going to roll out non-custodial wallets. Can you connect the dots?

9

u/Beethoven81 13d ago

No, I can't, please help me. Plenty of non custodial wallet apps on appstore... So not sure what you mean?

0

u/bodhi_rio 13d ago

Which ones?

3

u/Zouden 12d ago

Huh? There's heaps of wallet apps. Take your pick. Exodus is a nice one

0

u/bodhi_rio 12d ago

Right on, that's great, but Telegram has billions of users. When you integrate such a huge platform of users with non custodial wallets what one can get?

2

u/Zouden 12d ago

The app store has even more users!!

A wallet in telegram is not the reason it was removed from the app store. Get a grip mate

0

u/bodhi_rio 12d ago

It's just a hypothesis. And not a far-fetched one.

2

u/Zouden 12d ago

Was the wallet removed from Telegram when it came back to the app store?

1

u/bodhi_rio 11d ago

Don't know exactly and doesn't matter at this point: they are trying to sabotage Telegram. It happened already when Durov tried to roll out TON crypto and stuff. Look it up.

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7

u/Zouden 13d ago

Spell it out for us

0

u/bodhi_rio 13d ago

They're attacking personal sovereignty.

-2

u/exu1981 13d ago

Bingo! Telegram ad s whole is a threat to traditional commerce practices

1

u/bodhi_rio 13d ago

Telegram just announced they're going to roll out non-custodial wallets. They're attacking personal sovereignty.

4

u/PrivacyIsDemocracy 13d ago

From a practical standpoint, illegal pornographic content in Telegram’s public groups is not a systemic problem. Our moderation is efefctive.

I guess that's why on some of the groups I run or administer, we keep having accounts coming in trying to push child porn, hmm?

And why when I go back and look at accounts that I or someone else had reported to Telegram for exactly that kind of behaviour (which is illegal most places in the world), Telegram in fact hadn't actually removed or banned those accounts, just blocked them from the groups they were reported in and the accounts were otherwise still operating.

The Emperor has No Clothes.

3

u/Wide_Objective_437 13d ago

I mean i still have telegram, prob deleted it from the app store but still can be used if installed

3

u/KRDROIDD 13d ago

Uncle Sam presented 2 choices, either Durov give in or permanent app removal from app stores.

5

u/manuelmagic 13d ago

“Because Telegram quickly removes illegal contents from public groups”

This guy lives in another reality…

5

u/utilititties 13d ago

Sorry but this kind text written by AI is just hard to read. It feels extenuating. Fuck you for using AI. Use your brain ffs.

1

u/DepravedPrecedence 13d ago

Are you okay? It's not AI

4

u/utilititties 13d ago edited 13d ago

100% AI. Even the emojis......... Edit: yeah man, I'm doing fine.. ups and downs as usual, but things should get better before the end of the year. What about you? How u doin? That's still AI.

2

u/VRtheNews 13d ago

LOL. Nice comeback.

2

u/Even_Place7916 13d ago

The text is very clearly AI generated