Telegram was founded in 2013 by two Russian brothers, Nikolai and Pavel Durov. Just days after Russia invaded Ukraine, Durov wrote that Telegram was "increasingly becoming a source of unverified information," and he worried about the app being used to "incite ethnic hatred." As a result, the pandemic saw many newcomers to Telegram, including prominent anti-vaccine activists who used the app's hands-off approach to share false information on shots, a study from the Institute for Strategic Dialogue shows. In 2018, Russia banned Telegram although it reversed the prohibition two years later. Perpetrators of such fraud use various marketing techniques to attract subscribers on their social media channels.
from sa