Telegram Appeals to Diverse Constituencies
February 25, 2021
Other than heated conflicts between US political parties, the recent coup happened because of the mass spread of conspiracy theories propagated by social media. Social media platforms, including YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, were used to communicate right wing extremist misinformation. In the past, it was difficult for bad acting extremists to pool their “knowledge” and meet liked minded individuals, but the Internet fixed that.
Many social media platforms kicked right wing extremists off their platform, because of crackdowns that followed post-coup. According to Vox’s article, “Why Right-Wing Extremists’ New Favorite Platform Is So Dangerous” the bad actors already found another tool to communicate. Telegram is a Dubai-based platform and only 2% of its users were US-based until the coup attempt. Now Telegram boasts 25 million new US users. Why do bad actors love Telegram?
“Telegram is currently the most downloaded app in the Google Play Store, having unseated Signal for the top spot in the United States. Telegram’s specific combination of features, however, make it especially popular among American right-wing extremists, who have joined the platform in droves after being kicked off of Twitter, Facebook, and Parler. The latter is another extremist favorite and was recently kicked off the internet, though it’s now back in a very limited form.”
Telegram has three components: private and public channels that only a limited number of people can follow, groups where up to 200,,000 can communicate, and Secret Chats-one-on-one encrypted conversations.
Some bad actors can reach larger groups to spread misinformation and they can do so anonymously. Telegram does not monitor its content, but after its been used to incite violence its developers did crackdown on some of the channels. Telegram is popular for another reason: It is a reasonably reliable app.
Since Telegram is not US-based it does not need to comply to the country’s standards, but we have heard that the company has a relationship with Mr. Putin’s telecommunications agency. Other countries may find it slightly more challenging to monitor.
Whitney Grace, February 25, 2021
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