7 ms·

A lot of really terrible takes in this comment section. Telegram didn't have encrypted groups by default, and telegram possessed a lot of content on their serve

• unsupp0rted 2y ago
  > Nothing more, nothing less. A lot more and a lot less than that. Arresting this CEO in France is largely a political decision, not a politically neutral enforcement action against the Telegram platform. They don’t perform the same enforcement against other entities they could go after.
  • devman0 2y ago
    He appears to be a French citizen, so who else should be doing the arresting?
  • StrLght 2y ago
    He holds French citizenship, apparently broke French laws, and got arrested on French soil. How is that a political decision?
    • throwaway48540 2y ago
      So, Russian citizen being arrested in Russia for breaking Russian laws against privacy and encryption wouldn't be political?
      • willsoon 2y ago
        Yes, because Russia is totalitarian. But they have a law against shitposting. OK. But it hurts my feelings.
        • throwaway48540 2y ago
          France isn't totalitarian by having laws against privacy and cryptography?
  • DandyDev 2y ago
    How is it not just a neutral enforcement action against the Telegram platform? The Telegram platform knowingly hosts illegal content in unencrypted format and does little to moderate that, which is illegal in many countries. The CEO is accountable for how the company operates and what happens on the platform. If Telegram breaks the law - which it does - it’s completely logical that the CEO is held accountable for that and is arrested
• 2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
• ashconnor 2y ago
  A sane comment in the slew of conspiracy theories, "service provider" apologists and misdirection of encryption being the issue.
  • zarzavat 2y ago
    Telegram always elicits bizarre reactions from the public. On one side there’s actual security professionals saying don’t use Telegram because it’s not fully E2E encrypted, and on the other side there’s people who are convinced that it’s secure because Marketing and that there’s this big conspiracy to stop people from using Telegram. The real conspiracy theory is: Telegram have never made any attempt to either implement full E2E or to dissuade their users for using it for politically sensitive messages. Why not?
    • fsflover 2y ago
      > Telegram have never made any attempt to either implement full E2E or to dissuade their users for using it It's probably true. There are still no e2ee chats on desktop, which includes my smartpon running GNU/Linux.
      • jmb99 2y ago
        Does iMessage not count and E2EE (with the caveat of disabling iCloud) to you? It’s available on desktop.
        • fsflover 2y ago
          I don't trust closed, non-auditable Apple ecosystem. See these: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25074959 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25074959 https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveillance/ https://sneak.berlin/20231005/apple-operating-system-surveil...
        • vinceguidry 2y ago
          Lol, just look at the person's handle.
• user_7832 2y ago
  > One cannot legally run a hosted, unmoderated content platform in the developed world, one will always be required to remove illegal materials and turn over materials in cooperation with law enforcement. Just would like to clarify, Telegram does take down channels/bots in some cases including copyright infringement. The only bots I’ve dealt with were music downloaders so I don’t know much about other kinds of takedowns, but it’s wrong to say that telegram doesn’t/didn’t take down material. Perhaps not enough or frequently enough, and I certainly don’t condone immoral activities- but they do do it sometimes.
  • lxgr 2y ago
    They do it whenever the risk of Apple or Google kicking them out of their respective app stores becomes too great. That's presumably the only entities they take content moderation input from.
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    • throwaway48540 2y ago
      Can't wait for the Telegram App Store
• whimsicalism 2y ago
  ultimately this fight against unmonitored messaging is going to be a lost one for the developed world. people who want encrypted group chats will get them
  • devman0 2y ago
    As I hinted at earlier Signal does not have this issue because generally they are not aware of the underlying content. Even if Signal becomes aware of said content, it likely isn't hosted on their servers anymore as their store and forward system is highly transient. The most signal could do is be compelled to block specific users and maybe shutdown certain groups (not sure on that last one, would have to review the group architecture)
    • whimsicalism 2y ago
      Precisely my point - moderated messaging in the modern era will ultimately be unenforceable. Which is why I don’t see why certain services should be legally penalized just because they don’t happen to be E2E encrypted. Like if Telegram was instead e2e encrypted, why should that be legal if what they were previously doing wasn’t?
      • devman0 2y ago
        I think there are two parts to this: 1) On the technical side, Telegram groups operate more like a bulletin board, content is posted and can be fetched over and over again, a bulletin board owner can be compelled to remove material and if non-cooperating considered to be facilitating. Signal is more like a conversation in the town-square or a letter box of sealed envelopes. Once the content is fetched, it's gone. If signal is made aware that certain envelopes contain material that needs to be removed, I'm sure they would do so provided they still possess them. 2) On the non-technical side, many countries have crimes that are all about who knew what and when did they know it and could that have acted (or did they have a duty to do so). Facilitating, accessory, accessory after the fact call it what you will but that's more of a legal / philosophical argument to be had about the legal system in general rather than telegram specifically. A situation were telegram was made aware of illegal activity and was hosting said content in the clear and did nothing is manifestly different from a case where those facts did not exist, in most legal systems.
• xwowsersx 2y ago
  Terrible takes notwithstanding, of which there are many, the issue I see with such arguments is that it's always possible to find legal violations that technically justify prosecution or imprisonment. However, the legal system only functions effectively if we trust that those handling the gray areas are motivated by the common good, rather than serving the interests of a select few or protecting an elite minority. Simply focusing on the arrest and comparing it to the alleged criminal activities on Telegram, along with the supposed lack of enforcement by the company, seems like turning a blind eye. It ignores the more likely reality that this is part of a broader effort to establish a censorship regime, with platforms like TikTok, X, Telegram, and Rumble already targeted. Accepting the official narrative and pretext at face value feels, frankly, a bit naive.
  • devman0 2y ago
    It's important to note that he has only just been arrested, so there will be a case laid out, a defense offered, facts tried, and ultimately a conviction or not. I don't find a lot of sense in speculating about why or why it didn't happen as that will presumably be surfaced during the trial itself. Such events may or may not be followed up on HN as most of time these things turn out to not be wide ranging conspiracies but more mundane wrong-doings or acquittals based on facts presented and mundane things do not get clicks.
    • eviks 2y ago
      > I don't find a lot of sense in speculating about why or why it didn't happen Yet you've started your comment with a strong speculation on why (and it's also a bit naive to presume such things are surfaced during trial)
      • dralley 2y ago
        It's not speculation if that's literally what the charges are, as per the court documents.
        • eviks 2y ago
• slim 2y ago
  Nothing more, nothing less Telegram has been operating for years and did not change recently to justify such an action yesterday. There's something more certainly. Maybe they did not comply with requests related to recent war in Ukraine or genocide in Palestine ?
  • alibert 2y ago
    The initial investigation which triggered the arrest was made by the OFMIN ("Office spécialisé dans la lutte contre les violences faites aux mineurs" basically the government branch tracking and fighting CSAM). Supposedly, Telegram (and by definition of the french law, the CEO) did not respond to requests for takedown of harmful content (or not enough or faster?) from the the OFMIN. This triggered another investigation looking globally at how Telegram handle content moderation on the public part of Telegram (Channel) which lead to all others charges of complicity. This is basically the CEO taking the fall because the (unreachable by french law) Telegram company is not on french soil and he made the mistake on landing here.
• samstave 2y ago
  I posted this else ITT, but whats your opinion on the following (I have NO opinion - as I cant verify any facts about anything - so I am just an Observer of the events and what people are saying:) --- https://i.imgur.com/ixak5vq.png https://i.imgur.com/ixak5vq.png >This reminds me of the entire plot to the last of the Bourne movies, Jason Bourne, where there is a scene of the head of some intel agency (Tommy Lee Jones) propositioned a social media founder to give them backdoor access or he would be killed. Great movie. https://youtu.be/VvfSkVDF8uE https://youtu.be/VvfSkVDF8uE Fun Thread: https://old.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1f0i2yi/guess_who_just_got_arrested_for_aiding_and/ https://old.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1f0i2yi/guess_w...
• alexey-salmin 2y ago
  > One cannot legally run a hosted, unmoderated content platform in the developed world, one will always be required to remove illegal materials and turn over materials in cooperation with law enforcement. Should you remove e.g blasphemy which is illegal in many countries including some of what I assume you call "developed world"?
  • alwa 2y ago
    You should certainly have a formal process to respond to those countries’ requests, and you might consider technical architectures that don’t leave you in direct custody and control of that content in the first place.
    • alexey-salmin 2y ago
      > You should certainly have a formal process to respond to those countries’ requests Mere responding is evidently not enough, you need to cooperate. > you might consider technical architectures that don’t leave you in direct custody and control of that content in the first place. This rules out the "public channel" feature. Essentially what you say boils down to a global publishing platform being impossible nowadays without random and contradictive censorship acts. While this is probably true, I definitely don't share the "yeah throw him to jail" sentiment. On the contrary, I miss very much the truly global Internet of early 2000s. If this was possible back then, it must be, generally speaking, possible? Are we going to see anything like this again in our lifetimes?
      • hananova 2y ago
        > Mere responding is evidently not enough, you need to cooperate. Only if the request is coming from a country with a lot of power to effect its judgments internationally, or from a country you plan to personally visit. Whether or not you agree with it, ignoring legal requests from the US, China, and the EU (and debatably some other countries), isn't really an option in this day and age.
        • 2y ago
• SergeAx 2y ago
  This is a fantastic case of hypocrisy here. I personally see Facebook ads for illegal drugs at least once a week, and nothing happens. I even stopped reporting it because it was obviously pointless. Why? Because Zuck is "our son of bitch".
  • celdon25 2y ago
    He's been publicly chewed out at hearings by U.S. Senators, at least on the Republican side, for things like that. But the senate apparently doesn't have the power to do anything about it, or at least prioritize it with the rest of what is on their plate. I agree though that if Zuckerberg had been a Russian citizen, France probably would have arrested him too.
• seoulmetro 2y ago
  >One cannot legally run a hosted, unmoderated content platform in the developed world, one will always be required to remove illegal materials and turn over materials in cooperation with law enforcement. One can. I think you're confusing censored with moderated. Google, Facebook, Instagram, etc. aren't moderated. They're censored. They refuse to moderate or not moderate. Censorship is a form of moderation, but it itself isn't enough to be considered moderated. Censorship is enough to make it not unmoderated though.
• eviks 2y ago
  > Nothing more, nothing less. That's a terribly simplistic take. And no, there are other providers that also cooperated less (not that you have reliable data on that for such a certain claim that you can't compare)
  • mdhb 2y ago
    Why is it that op can’t make the claim but you magically can? How does that work?
    • eviks 2y ago
      The magic is all (in his claim) vs few (in mine). You don't need omniscience for the latter
      • mdhb 2y ago
        Respectfully what the hell are you talking about? They made a claim that Telegram are particularly unresponsive to legitimate requests from various law enforcement groups which as a statement goes isn’t particularly controversial. You seemed to have implied that: 1. There is no way to know that. 2. “Others” cooperate even less. Do you have inside knowledge or not?
• up2isomorphism 2y ago
  ” One cannot legally run a hosted, unmoderated content platform in the developed world,” It is so funny you put a “developed” there, as if this is an advantage compared to developing ones.
• norswap 2y ago
  > [...] telegram possessed a lot of content on their servers that they had been made aware was illegal and didn't cooperate. Do we know this for sure? What are the sources? If that were true — then it surely would be less surprising, and even expected, but I would argue it's still bad: first because encryption would lead to the same result (as you point out) and second because what's illegal is often a matter of perspective: Telegram had content that was illegal in Russia, and didn't collaborate.