March 05, 2025
The founder and CEO of Telegram, Pavel Durov, was arrested on August 24, 2024, at Paris-Le Bourget Airport. French authorities detained him as part of an investigation into Telegram’s alleged insufficient moderation of illegal activities on its platform, including child exploitation and drug trafficking. Following his arrest, Durov was indicted on multiple charges on August 28, 2024. He was placed under judicial supervision, prohibited from leaving France, and required to post bail of €5 million. As of February 2025, Durov remains under judicial supervision in France, awaiting further legal proceedings where he must appear at a police station twice a week. Should he be found guilty the most serious charge complicity in the administration of an online platform to enable organized crime and illicit transactions carries a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment, and a €500,000 ($521,000) fine.
In response to their CEO’s arrest Telegram announced plans to enhance its moderation policies and has expressed a willingness to cooperate more closely with law enforcement. They have been seeking to ensure that they are co-operating with authorities while claiming to continue to prioritize users’ privacy.
In this blog, we will explore what changes Telegram have said they have made, what effect DarkOwl analysts are seeing in response to these changes and what impact we expect to see in the future.
What have Telegram Said?
In September 2024 Telegram announced, via Durov’s account, that they would be changing their terms of service in order to deter criminals from using the messaging platform. It was reported that Telegram would provide details of IP addresses and phone numbers to law enforcement and government agencies if they were provided with proper legal requests.
Figure 1: Announcement on Durov’s TG channel regarding changes to terms of service
As well as agreeing to comply with valid legal requests to share user information, they also announced that they would be changing how the global search feature works to make it more difficult for users to find certain channels and bots. They claimed that the global search feature had previously made it too easy for illicit channels to be discovered.
Telegram had made some changes in the past, despite claiming to be a platform that respects privacy and freedom of speech above all things, they did remove 78 ISIS channels in response to the Terrorist attack in Paris in 2015. They had also taken some action for the platform to be in reinstated in Brazil after it was banned for lack of cooperation with government agencies. However, these changes appeared to have more impact.
What Reaction have these Changes Had?
DarkOwl analysts immediately observed reactions to the arrest of Durov, but there have also been reactions to the announcements to the changes in the terms of use and the fact that they have agreed to work with law enforcement.
Figure 2: Source: DarkOwl Vision
Not only were users talking about what had been announced by the platform, they were also appealing to them directly to ask them not to remove (ban) their channel as they were not breaking any of the terms or conditions.
Figure 3: Source: DarkOwl Vision
They were following the rules….
Figure 4: Source: DarkOwl Vision
However, Telegram was not clear about what type of content they considered to be illicit and or contravenes their terms of service.
Some other users and or groups took the decision that they would move away from Telegram and move to other platforms which they believed were more secure or more accepting of their views.
Figure 5: Source: DarkOwl Vision
Figure 6: Source: DarkOwl Vision
Others stated that they would not leave the platform, but they would continue to operate on multiple other platforms, presumably with the hope that any channels which may be removed would not stop them from being able to spread their message.
Figure 7: Source: DarkOwl Vision
While some prepared for when they thought their account would be banned.
Figure 8: Source: Telegram
What Action is Telegram Taking?
DarkOwl analysts have observed that, when using the global search fewer results are being returned which related to generic terms which relate to illicit activity. This is different behavior than the global search previously had. However, if you know which specific channel you want to find in most cases it will still appear, but not all.
Figure 9: No results returned from global search
DarkOwl analysts have observed that a number of channels which were used to share illicit material have been removed by Telegram. A variety of reasons have been provided by the platform for which they channels have been removed. They have also provided details of the specific jurisdiction that the channel broke the laws of.
Figure 10: Source: Telegram
They have also removed channels and or messages that they claim have contravened copyright laws, which indicates ha they are not just removing illicit channels but those that are contravening other types of laws.
Figure 11: Source: Telegram
One area in which Telegram have always claimed to take action is in the area of Terrorism, particularly the group ISIS. As mentioned about, since 2015 Telegram have claimed that they remove content relating to the terrorist group. However, channels continue to “pop up.”
Figure 12: Source: Telegram
Some Telegram users have taken the matter into their own hands, with groups like ISIS Watch reporting how many channels they have identified related to terrorist content and how many of them have been removed.
Figure 13: ISIS Watch Telegram Channel
Reviewing their posts from February 2023 and February 2025, it is clear that the number of channels that have been banned from the platform has increased massively. Although it cannot be confirmed, this does seem to be in correlation with the new terms of service that Telegram introduced in 2024. However, it is also possible the number of channels relating to Terrorism activity has also increased massively in the intervening time as the popularity of Telegram has grown.
Figure 14: ISIS Watch post from February 2023
Figure 15: ISIS Watch post from February 2025
What is the Future?
While DarkOwl have observed channels being removed or banned by Telegram and users talking about moving to other platforms we have not observed and actual migration away from the use of Telegram to date.
Telegram is unlike other messaging apps in that it operates more like a social media platform, allowing users to chat with strangers and share views across a wide audience. Many other messaging apps do not allow for this kind of activity, making them less attractive to Telegram users.
While telegram does seem to be making a concerted effort to make it more difficult for user to find illicit channels, if users are already in these communities, they will likely be provided with invite links to new or existing groups. Meaning that the company has only made it more difficult for outsiders to fine this information.
And while channels are being removed, there is nothing that stops users from creating new channels which share the same information. Therefore, the company are inadvertently entering a game of Wack-o-mole which is unlikely to change. It is yet to be seen if their willingness to work with law enforcement will be a deterrent to criminal actors using the site – for those outside of wester jurisdictions it is unlikely.
DarkOwl will continue to monitor this evolving situation.
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