🇰🇿 I recently returned from Kazakhstan — the economic powerhouse of Central Asia. I visited majestic Astana, vibrant Almaty, picturesque Burabay, and the scenic Charyn Canyon 🥺
⬆️ The beauty of Kazakhstan can only be rivaled by its ambitions. The country attracts international companies and tech startups with business-friendly policies and favorable taxes. It also improves its edge in education and science by supporting innovative schools and universities 📘
📞 12.5 million of 20 million Kazakhs use Telegram monthly, a 25% increase from last year. We are proud to serve as the main communication platform for the Kazakh people and hope to continue to be a tool that accelerates its rapid economic and digital transformation🫡
🇰🇿 I recently returned from Kazakhstan — the economic powerhouse of Central Asia. I visited majestic Astana, vibrant Almaty, picturesque Burabay, and the scenic Charyn Canyon 🥺
⬆️ The beauty of Kazakhstan can only be rivaled by its ambitions. The country attracts international companies and tech startups with business-friendly policies and favorable taxes. It also improves its edge in education and science by supporting innovative schools and universities 📘
📞 12.5 million of 20 million Kazakhs use Telegram monthly, a 25% increase from last year. We are proud to serve as the main communication platform for the Kazakh people and hope to continue to be a tool that accelerates its rapid economic and digital transformation🫡
The next bit isn’t clear, but Durov reportedly claimed that his resignation, dated March 21st, was an April Fools’ prank. TechCrunch implies that it was a matter of principle, but it’s hard to be clear on the wheres, whos and whys. Similarly, on April 17th, the Moscow Times quoted Durov as saying that he quit the company after being pressured to reveal account details about Ukrainians protesting the then-president Viktor Yanukovych. A Russian Telegram channel with over 700,000 followers is spreading disinformation about Russia's invasion of Ukraine under the guise of providing "objective information" and fact-checking fake news. Its influence extends beyond the platform, with major Russian publications, government officials, and journalists citing the page's posts. 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. Again, in contrast to Facebook, Google and Twitter, Telegram's founder Pavel Durov runs his company in relative secrecy from Dubai. At the start of 2018, the company attempted to launch an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) which would enable it to enable payments (and earn the cash that comes from doing so). The initial signals were promising, especially given Telegram’s user base is already fairly crypto-savvy. It raised an initial tranche of cash – worth more than a billion dollars – to help develop the coin before opening sales to the public. Unfortunately, third-party sales of coins bought in those initial fundraising rounds raised the ire of the SEC, which brought the hammer down on the whole operation. In 2020, officials ordered Telegram to pay a fine of $18.5 million and hand back much of the cash that it had raised.
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