Switch to Signal. It's not like there's anything to learn, the UI isn't all that different from WhatsApp
this post was submitted on 01 Jun 2025
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Collaborating with Xitter is not the most distasteful thing Telegram has done. Its marketing model has been to consistently lie to people about being encrypted when that's only true in very limited cases. It has also catered to criminals by attempting to make it difficult to comply with legal demands for information, while holding that information for its own purposes.
Signal, on the other hand is always encrypted and does its best to hold as little information about users as possible.
Also I don’t think it’s worth the effort to teach my parents yet another messaging app, like signal.
What is there to learn? Every popular messaging app has pretty much the same UI.
Isn't it good for a communication company to be noncompliant with people's conversations?
Being unable to comply (signal) and selectively refusing to comply while still having access to the data (telegram) is not equivalent
"Selectively" is a new word that wasn't mentioned in the post I replied to. I get that it's better to not have access to the data at all, and lying to customers is shitty, etc. I use signal and not telegram. But 'refusing to comply with demands from other groups for data access is correct behavior' was my only argument. Nothing about equivalence
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It usually wasn't conversations that were at issue. People would engage in criminals acts, such as trading child sexual abuse media in large unencrypted group chats. Law enforcement would find links to those chats, join them, and observe criminal acts, leading to court orders to Telegram to disclose whatever identifying information it had about the offenders, such as phone numbers and IP addresses.
Telegram intentionally split storage of that kind of information across jurisdictions that do not cooperate so that it was effectively impossible to obtain orders for all of them. They bragged their marketing materials that they have never complied with a court order for user information. Taken as a whole, I see that as intentionally facilitating child abuse.
Signal's approach is pretty much the inverse; rather than hoard data about users and shield people they know have done evil, Signal has ensured that it does not know the contents of any conversation, nor anything about users other than when they created the account and most recently accessed it.
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there's no learning curve with Signal, it's almost exactly like whatsapp.
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Can you use signal?
Telegram was developed by Russians and HQ is in United Arab Emirates. They have always been sketchy af.
Telegram's owners are at odds with the Russian government though, hence the move to another country.
There's plenty of problems with Telegram without having to resort to Russophobia already.
For example their chats aren't even E2E-encrypted by default and afaik there's no way to have encrypted group chats either.
I'd take Telegram over WhatsApp as I find Telegram, ignoring privacy concerns, is an excellent messenger. Much better than WhatsApp
But, Signal's pretty great.
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I've heard good things about Signal, maybe try that?
Also I don’t think it’s worth the effort to teach my parents yet another messaging app, like signal.
My friend, just set up Signal on their phones, put it in place of the Telegram app and watch them not even notice anything changed.
Not if they're the kind of users my parents are. An update moves a button from the bottom-left to the bottom-right and suddenly "the app you gave me is broken again".
Also, don't sneak-change things on other people's phones.
I personally avoid telegram for anything sensitive or personal. Because there is no end to end encryption. You should move to Signal.
I really distrust telegram. There are some many dark patterns around it and the server is closed source so I'd say the distrust is very well deserved.
has there been cases where telegram chat been leaked/compromised?
Many. One particularly awful case is how at the beginning of ruzi invasion of Ukraine a lot several Russian resistance figures were compromised through Telegram due to it using phone numbers for security which are incredibly insecure and needless to say in control of the government.
If you get rid of Telegran, at least you'd only have one shitty messenger instead of two.
It’s actually easier to switch over if you’re using a specific app just for family chats. Imagine trying to convince them to switch if they used telegram to communicate with everyone else as well. I’d say take the chance and switch over to Signal while you still can. I moved my family over from viber to signal a long time ago and the transition wasn’t as hard as I expected.
Threema. And don’t forget, real privacy and security, with centralized services, is never free. The app is tested by third party and is open source. And, you don’t have to share your phone number, unlike with Signal.
You no longer have to share your phone number in signal. They added a unique user identifier a while ago that you can share to add new contacts. This is not permanent by the way, you can change this user identifier anytime.
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