Oleksandra Matviichuk, a Kyiv-based lawyer and head of the Center for Civil Liberties, called Durov’s position "very weak," and urged concrete improvements. Telegram users are able to send files of any type up to 2GB each and access them from any device, with no limit on cloud storage, which has made downloading files more popular on the platform. Emerson Brooking, a disinformation expert at the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab, said: "Back in the Wild West period of content moderation, like 2014 or 2015, maybe they could have gotten away with it, but it stands in marked contrast with how other companies run themselves today." Russians and Ukrainians are both prolific users of Telegram. They rely on the app for channels that act as newsfeeds, group chats (both public and private), and one-to-one communication. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Telegram has remained an important lifeline for both Russians and Ukrainians, as a way of staying aware of the latest news and keeping in touch with loved ones. 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."
from ua
