Telegram Founder Listed in Leaked Pegasus Project Data

Amid the varied cast of people whose numbers appear on a list of individuals selected by NSO Group's client governments, one name stands out as particularly ironic. Pavel Durov, the enigmatic Russian-born tech billionaire who has built his reputation on creating an unhackable messaging app, finds his own number on the list. From a report: Durov, 36, is the founder of Telegram, which claims to have more than half a billion users. Telegram offers end-to-end encrypted messaging and users can also set up "channels" to disseminate information quickly to followers. It has found popularity among those keen to evade the snooping eyes of governments, whether they be criminals, terrorists or protesters battling authoritarian regimes. In recent years, Durov has publicly rubbished the security standards of competitors, particularly WhatsApp, which he has claimed is "dangerous" to use. By contrast, he has positioned Telegram as a plucky upstart determined to safeguard the privacy of its users at all costs.

What's this world coming to?

[TomGreenhaw]

You know you're in trouble when you can't trust a Russian software developer.

Re:What's this world coming to?

[billyswong]

The game is like this:
if you may talk anti-America and anti-China stuff, chat in Russian software.
If you may talk anti-America and anti-Russia stuff, chat in Chinese software.
If you may talk anti-China and anti-Russia stuff, chat in American software.
If you may anti-all-three of them, chat in whatever software because either you are doomed, or no security agencies take you seriously so you may be safe after all.

Re:

[Anubis IV]

Funny that Telegram and Signal just seem to be weathering the test of time. A man is known by their enemies

When Russia bans an app for failing to add state-mandated backdoors and threatens to block AWS entirely when the app bypasses its ban by proxying through AWS, then reinstates the app so that anyone can use it again, you have to wonder what changed.

Did policies change? Not that I'm aware. Did the political capital to go after the app run out? Doubtful, since Putin seems to be consolidating power. Was a backdoor added to the app, either knowingly or unknowingly? We'd have to reverse engineer the executables t

Re:

[shanen]

Mod parent funny, though the grandparent's humor was strained and a bit misdirected. Actually, the parent humor is strained, too, considering the rising quality of the translation software...

I wish I could extend the run of jokes, but the joke's on us and I'm having trouble laughing. My phone might be recording each of my laughs and correlating my laughs to the contextual factors so my (paranoid) enemies can send me the killer joke (and eliminate me with a personalized version of the funniest joke in the wo

That's a seriously pathetic hit-piece attempt.

[Pierre Pants]

Oh, he's behind Telegram, he's Russian (never mind the fact he had to get away from Russia), and he's a billionaire, and his number is on the list, therefore he and everything he's related to has been compromised. What moron wrote this shit? Forget it, I don't want to know. I just wanna tell you that you're pathetic.

Re:That's a seriously pathetic hit-piece attempt.

[Anubis IV]

therefore he and everything he's related to has been compromised.

Just to make sure we're on the same page, being on the list means he was a potential target for government surveillance, not that he was aiding in government surveillance. The fact that governments are going after him lends credence to the notion that he's honoring the trust his users are putting in him. Sure, it's possible his phone has been compromised, but it seems like a stretch to assume that "compromised phone" means "compromised Telegram".

That is odd...

[itiswhatitiwijgalt]

Codemonkey(Ron Watkins) just posted this message in gab.com a few minutes ago: I was just banned from Telegram. Was in a private channel preparing a big drop about Pegasus. Right as I was preparing to push info out, telegram booted me and banned my phone number. I appealed the ban, but I doubt it will be effective. If the Telegram appeal is granted, then I will address this issue again. I believe Pepper is still an admin on the codemonkeyzchat channel. I emailed her and will ask her to pin a message and

How is this ironic

[fermion]

When you a Bond Villain that creates a virus to destroy the world, you also create an antidote. That is profiteering 101. Sell the WMD and the medical supplies.

NSO are lightweights...

[VeryFluffyBunny]

I'm pretty sure that every govt. SIGINT agency has access to accumulated profiles on whoever they deem to be 'persons of interest', including a lot of personal information, known associates, habits & routines, mobile location data, financial & medical info, etc.. They have very, very long lists that encompass anyone & everyone who it might be useful to monitor or manipulate in some way when the need arises. The vast majority of people on these lists are lawyers, journalists, publishers, people who work in media & news, banking & finance, executives, people who work for NGOs, international organisations, etc., within the countries' own borders. This is the day-to-day 'bread & butter' work of SIGINT for national security.

The NSO client list is just a tiny glimpse through the cracks at what govts. & some corporations have been doing as routine & on a much bigger scale for decades. The tools change with the times but the basic principles are the same.

Re:

[shanen]

Mod parent "sadly accurate". Most deserving (of the current comments) to have been FP (as I understand the topic). But not bleak enough.

I'm currently reading The Age of Surveillance Capitalism by Shoshana Zuboff and I can already recommend it as background reading on the topic. (She had an interesting section on IBM's Personality Insights, even including the demo link I used to share (but which has recently been blocked).) Cory Doctorow wrote a short ebook in response, too. (But his solutions seemed weak

Re:

[VeryFluffyBunny]

Agree up to a point but I think big data has been over-hyped, as these things usually do. AI can find patterns in noise, that's what it does; very elaborate versions of Bayesian inference. However, AI cannot "make sense" of those patterns or decide whether they are significant or not. Essentially, it's a high-tech version of p-hacking, which is regarded as malpractice by those who generate genuine human knowledge because there's little or no controls for threats to validity. You can fool the most advanced A

Re:

[shanen]

I think you're partly being misled by the over-training problem, but in terms of predictions, they can be tested. If pushing Button A consistently causes Result B, then the prediction is working. Whether or not human beings can understand why.

Much of it is just scalability. Most psychologists these days assess personality using a system with five dimensions. Not too difficult to wrap your head around the number five. The Personality Insights I mentioned profiled a few dozen dimensions, with a couple of leve

Re:

[jythie]

They are lightweights yes, but they also lower the bar to access, and that is what makes them news. Just like any other military grade hardware, governments having exclusive control and access : not really news.. private company using civilian infrastructure to sell such things broadly : news.

False

[ayesnymous]

The FBI couldn't hack into that one iPhone a few years ago. Doubt the NSO would have any trouble with that.

Huh?

[Nrrqshrr]

>"It has found popularity among those keen to evade the snooping eyes of governments, whether they be criminals, terrorists or protesters battling authoritarian regimes."

How about just people who like their privacy? Do you have to be a criminal, terrorist, or freedom fighter to deserve private communication?

Re:

[BAReFO0t]

They use Signal.

Seriously, where the hell do these morons come from, who believe Telegram offers any level of privacy??
NEWSFLASH: IT DOES NOT DO END-TO-END-ENCRYPTION BY DEFAULT! Let alone with perfect forward secrecy and all the bells and whistles that actually would make it secure. It is closed source too, so you can't even verify if its encryption doesn't have some blatant gaping hole. (Yeah, anyone can be paid to call themselves an "independent auditor". Unless you personally know that auditor, for you,

Idiotic framing

[sinij]

whether they be criminals, terrorists or protesters

Might as well add pedophiles to the list to make drive-by smear complete.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion