this post was submitted on 26 Sep 2023
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[–] photonic_sorcerer@lemmy.dbzer0.com 150 points 1 year ago (11 children)

The worst part is, they're partnering with Tencent.

Telegram is dead.

[–] fosforus@sopuli.xyz 55 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blocking_of_Telegram_in_Russia

"On 18 June 2020 Roskomnadzor lifted its ban on Telegram after it 'agrees to help with extremism investigations'."

That should be enough information. I'm on Signal, waiting for Matrix to perhaps stop sucking before I die of old age.

[–] jivandabeast@lemmy.browntown.dev 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Am also gonna stick with signal, eyeing up matrix. But what issues? The only reason i haven't tested it out yet is none of my friends seem too keen on trying it.

[–] fosforus@sopuli.xyz 10 points 1 year ago

For a lack of a better term: jank. Too much jank. For one instance, I have never seen in Whatsapp or Signal the phrase "unable to decrypt message". I can deal with that personally, but >90% of the people I need to communicate to with messengers will drop a service and never look back if they see that.

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[–] totallynotfbi@lemm.ee 25 points 1 year ago (3 children)

This week, TON Foundation announced that it’s forged a partnership with Tencent Cloud, which has “already successfully supported TON validators and plans to expand its services further to help meet TON’s high compute intensity and network bandwidth needs.” Validators, in web3 lingo, are participants that help authenticate transactions in a blockchain network.

It looks like the partnership with Tencent only extends to their Web3 blockchain thing, and there doesn't seem to be any partnership in the main app so it's not the end of the world - at least, for now.

Also, what even is this TON blockchain? I never knew Telegram had anything to do with crypto :/

[–] fruitleatherpostcard@lemm.ee 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, nah. Anything the CCP can slip it’s slimy festering little dick into, it will.

There’s no way in hell that Telegram is secure.

[–] totallynotfbi@lemm.ee 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I guess, but I don't see how much they can really influence Telegram without any stake in the app itself. They only seem to have a deal for cloud-hosting with the TON Foundation, a non-critical part of the app, and even that appears to be non-exclusive. So if Tencent tries to force a bad decision onto Telegram, what's stopping them from severing ties and moving everything over to another provider?

Of course, we don't know what the situation will be like in the future, but at this present moment, I don't think Telegram's security has been breached by this. (Also I think you triple-posted this comment)

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[–] chi_chan@sopuli.xyz 20 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Telegram is partnering with tencent??

[–] briongloid@aussie.zone 19 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They are renting server space off a big company, not much different than AWS or Azure.

[–] just_another_person@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago (5 children)
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[–] whitecapstromgard@sh.itjust.works 52 points 1 year ago (9 children)

Telegram is a suprisingly good app.

  • Open source clients
  • Decent Linux client on the laptop (whatsapp desktop is just terrible)
  • It can be downloaded without Google's appstore.

I wish other apps were half as good as Telegram.

[–] EqMinMax@lemmy.world 53 points 1 year ago (2 children)
  • More importantly, non-electron app.
[–] Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It bothers me that the major complaint is not the privacy issues or the people who own it behind the scenes...

but the technology used to build the desktop application. Electron is just a tool.

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[–] Edgelord_Of_Tomorrow@lemmy.world 26 points 1 year ago (17 children)
  • Owned by the Russians

  • Partnered with the ~~CCP~~ Tencent

[–] totallynotfbi@lemm.ee 30 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Hasn't the founder been a vocal critic of Russia for years, including the Ukraine war? I don't really see why that would be a concern, especially since Telegram is supposedly owned by a US LLC

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[–] Vilian@lemmy.ca 21 points 1 year ago (2 children)

a yes, the ceo that isn't on russia and is viewd as a criminal for being against the war?

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[–] smileyhead@discuss.tchncs.de 21 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Telegram has the best clients ever. But those clients need to connect to something and this is where we encounter a big problem.

[–] Virkkunen@kbin.social 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But isn't that the whole point of a messaging service? Connect to something else that's not local and have your messages exchanged?

[–] Muehe@lemmy.ml 16 points 1 year ago (8 children)

I think smileyhead is alluding to the fact that Telegram servers are not open source, just the clients are.

[–] Amir@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Why would it matter if the servers are open source? How would you ever verify they are running the exact build they claim they are?

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[–] Engywuck@lemm.ee 44 points 1 year ago (4 children)

The shitty forced "stories" did me question seriously this once wonderful app. If I'd want to look at crappy TikTok-like shorts from other people, I'd be on TikTok.

[–] weedazz@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I had the same worry when it happened to signal

[–] Engywuck@lemm.ee 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Signal has stories as well?

[–] FrostyCaveman@lemm.ee 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Inexplicably, yes. It does

[–] EngineerGaming@feddit.nl 7 points 1 year ago

Hmm, should we add the ability to register from desktop easily? Nah, let's just add stories)

[–] MeanEYE@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

Yes, but the can be disabled, which I do automatically.

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[–] cyberpunk007@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Once I saw the stories I was like ok wtf. How do I turn this off?

Maybe revanced manager can do it.

[–] Engywuck@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'm using Nekogram, that at least allows to automatically hide (archive) them.

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[–] jet@hackertalks.com 21 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Telegram has open source their client code. Not their server code. It's even on f Droid.

[–] smileyhead@discuss.tchncs.de 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (8 children)

But it's starting to get worse. Now they won't send you an SMS code for registration unless you are using official build of the app. Even chat app under libre licence must connect with something...

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[–] cyberpunk007@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Thank you. Installed fork client and now that stupid story crap is gone and there's new stuff I can do to fine tune things.

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[–] redcalcium@lemmy.institute 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I was under impression that Google Play and Apple App Store don't allow apps that can do practically everything (super apps). Is it really allowed? If a completely new company submit a chat app that somehow includes taxy hailing, food delivery, nfc/qr wallet and micro-loan features all at once instead of adding those features gradually in future updates, would Apple and Google accept the app?

[–] friendlyhobo@lemm.ee 12 points 1 year ago (3 children)

WeChat and other composite apps are already on the stores, so I don’t see why others also wouldn’t be allowed.

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[–] figaro@lemdro.id 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Everyone complaining about both telegram and signal here should, idk, just start dead dropping handwritten notes to people inside of dead rats, like the true privacy experts.

Privacy is important, yes. But if all of my friends use telegram, I'm going to use it too. Not only that, I'm going to be happy about it, because the telegram app is 1000x better than pretty much any other messaging app.

braces for angry downvotes

[–] PlushySD@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago

You don't understand, when it's only you in that platform, it's the ultimate privacy.

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[–] HaggierRapscallier@feddit.nl 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It does have a ton of functions tbh. I use it to access bots and keep notes. Even repositories for apps - Revanced Extended uses it for e.g. !

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