Two days after Russia invaded Ukraine, an account on the Telegram messaging platform posing as President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged his armed forces to surrender. "We as Ukrainians believe that the truth is on our side, whether it's truth that you're proclaiming about the war and everything else, why would you want to hide it?," he said. "Someone posing as a Ukrainian citizen just joins the chat and starts spreading misinformation, or gathers data, like the location of shelters," Tsekhanovska said, noting how false messages have urged Ukrainians to turn off their phones at a specific time of night, citing cybersafety. The fake Zelenskiy account reached 20,000 followers on Telegram before it was shut down, a remedial action that experts say is all too rare. But because group chats and the channel features are not end-to-end encrypted, Galperin said user privacy is potentially under threat.
from ca
