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A few factual inconsistencies indicate that this person poorly understands at least something they rant about: > Russia banned Signal and designated WhatsApp (
by orbital-decay 2y ago
A few factual inconsistencies indicate that this person poorly understands at least something they rant about:
> Russia banned Signal and designated WhatsApp (Meta) as "extremist organisation".
They banned Meta and Instagram the social networks after they "temporarily allowed" death threats to Russians at the start of the war, announcing an exception to their rules. This wasn't related to WhatsApp or its encryption, and it continues working unblocked.
> There was a "fake news" that TG got banned in Russia. That's not true. Instead, third parties were "temporarily" banned for using TG's API. All users (in Russia) were using TG just fine. No ban. No restrictions.
They really did wage a mini-war against Telegram a few years back, TG connection was spotty or blocked for a while, but eventually the block failed on the technical level, as Telegram resisted it by introducing proxies. This wasn't due to encryption (FSB & Co never had any issues deanonymizing TG users and exfiltrating data without even needing the cooperation from TG's side, and TG was never perceived as private by actual users, so I'm not sure what the half of the rant is about), this was due to their refusal to deplatform the opposition. IIRC they came to some "agreement" long after it ended, which is way more concerning. But, "fake news", seriously?