Right now the digital security needs of Russians and Ukrainians are very different, and they lead to very different caveats about how to mitigate the risks associated with using Telegram. For Ukrainians in Ukraine, whose physical safety is at risk because they are in a war zone, digital security is probably not their highest priority. They may value access to news and communication with their loved ones over making sure that all of their communications are encrypted in such a manner that they are indecipherable to Telegram, its employees, or governments with court orders. Again, in contrast to Facebook, Google and Twitter, Telegram's founder Pavel Durov runs his company in relative secrecy from Dubai. Oleksandra Matviichuk, a Kyiv-based lawyer and head of the Center for Civil Liberties, called Durov’s position "very weak," and urged concrete improvements. The War on Fakes channel has repeatedly attempted to push conspiracies that footage from Ukraine is somehow being falsified. One post on the channel from February 24 claimed without evidence that a widely viewed photo of a Ukrainian woman injured in an airstrike in the city of Chuhuiv was doctored and that the woman was seen in a different photo days later without injuries. The post, which has over 600,000 views, also baselessly claimed that the woman's blood was actually makeup or grape juice. Individual messages can be fully encrypted. But the user has to turn on that function. It's not automatic, as it is on Signal and WhatsApp.
from ru
