Why is Telegram in trouble with the law?

• Telegram founder Durov investigated for illegal content
• Critics question Telegram's moderation efforts
• Telegram's data structure hinders access

LONDON - The shock arrest of Telegram boss Pavel Durov has put a new spotlight on how the messaging app moderates illegal content, with potential implications for other social media platforms.

A French judge put Russian-born Durov, who also has French citizenship, under formal investigation on Aug. 28 for suspected complicity in running an online platform that allows illicit transactions, child sex abuse images, drug trafficking and fraud.

Durov's lawyer said it was "absurd to say that a platform or its boss are responsible for any abuse" carried out on the platform, and that Telegram was abiding by European laws.

However, online safety groups and researchers have raised multiple concerns about how Telegram operates, amid claims that it does not do enough to curtail illegal content.

Telegram is not encrypted by default like WhatsApp or Signal yet its specific set-up makes it difficult for law enforcement to request data. 

It also does not release transparency reports like other platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok. Here's what you need to know. 

What is Telegram?

Telegram was launched by Pavel and Nikolai Durov in 2013. Users can engage in direct communication but can also take part in group chats and 'channels' that can broadcast to unlimited audiences.

It has approximately 950 million monthly active users worldwide and makes money through advertising in public channels and through the Telegram Premium subscriptions users pay for more features.

Telegram is influential in Russia, Ukraine and the republics of the former Soviet Union, with analysts calling it "a virtual battlefield" for Russia's war in Ukraine.

It is also popular in India - more so than in Russia or the United States - Indonesia, and Brazil.

Is Telegram encrypted and what is a 'secret chat'?

Despite promoting itself as a privacy-first messaging platform, Telegram is not end-to-end encrypted by default.

This means that anyone would be able to see conversations that take place on Telegram, and it is this characteristic that sets it apart from apps such as Signal and WhatsApp.

The app does have optional end-to-end encryption, called 'secret chats', but these can only be activated when the other user is online.

How does Telegram moderate content?

"All Telegram chats and group chats are private amongst their participants," Telegram says in its FAQ. "We do not process any requests related to them."

There are report buttons in the app to contact the abuse team, but Durov has said that Telegram only has around 50 full-time employees.

For comparison, Signal has 50 employees but offers far fewer features and has around 20 million monthly users.

Facebook, which has nearly 3 billion monthly active users, employs 15,000 content moderators alone.

Telegram is not a member of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) or the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), which would assist the company in taking down child sexual abuse material (CSAM). 

Other social networks - including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat and WhatsApp - are all members.

"There's no excuse. All platforms have it within their gift to do something, now, to prevent the spread of child sexual abuse imagery. We have the tools, we have the data, and any failure to stop this known content from proliferating is an active and deliberate choice," Heidi Kempster, deputy CEO of the IWF, told Context.

She said her organisation had made multiple attempts to engage with Telegram over the last year, to no avail.

"Children are the victims here and every time an image or video of sexual abuse is shared on Telegram, those children are made victims all over again. They deserve a safer internet, and we urge Telegram, and other services, to do everything they possibly can to help work towards the safe, secure internet all children are entitled to," she added.

Telegram only has 41 million users in the European Union, below the 45-million threshold that would subject it to the bloc's Digital Services Act. 

That means it is not categorised as a very large online platform, and not subject to stricter transparency and content moderation rules.

A report from the Stanford Internet Observatory in 2023 said that Telegram had been observed "as failing to perform even basic content enforcement on public channels, with instances of known CSAM being detected and reported by our ingest systems."

Brian Fishman, former policy director for counterterrorism and dangerous organisations at Facebook/Meta, said on Meta's messaging app Threads that Telegram was a "key hub for ISIS," adding that what Telegram has is "not 'light' content moderation (but) a different approach entirely".

Telegram did not respond to a request for comment on Fishman's comments or content moderation before this article was published.

Does Telegram comply with the law?

Although Telegram can look at the contents of private messages and would therefore be a treasure trove of information for law enforcement, the structure of its data storage makes it difficult for states to request data.

Telegram distributes the chat data across multiple centres around the world, which are controlled by different legal entities spread across different jurisdictions.

This means that forcing Telegram to give up data would require multiple court documents from multiple countries.

"Thanks to this structure, we can ensure that no single government or block of like-minded countries can intrude on people's privacy and freedom of expression. Telegram can be forced to give up data only if an issue is grave and universal enough to pass the scrutiny of several different legal systems around the world," Telegram says in its FAQ.

The platform says it has disclosed no user data to third parties or governments.

(Reporting by Adam Smith; Editing by Clar Ni Chonghaile.)