"Your messages about the movement of the enemy through the official chatbot … bring new trophies every day," the government agency tweeted. Messages are not fully encrypted by default. That means the company could, in theory, access the content of the messages, or be forced to hand over the data at the request of a government. Now safely in France with his spouse and three of his children, Kliuchnikov scrolls through Telegram to learn about the devastation happening in his home country. Since its launch in 2013, Telegram has grown from a simple messaging app to a broadcast network. Its user base isn’t as vast as WhatsApp’s, and its broadcast platform is a fraction the size of Twitter, but it’s nonetheless showing its use. While Telegram has been embroiled in controversy for much of its life, it has become a vital source of communication during the invasion of Ukraine. But, if all of this is new to you, let us explain, dear friends, what on Earth a Telegram is meant to be, and why you should, or should not, need to care. Two days after Russia invaded Ukraine, an account on the Telegram messaging platform posing as President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged his armed forces to surrender.
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