Telegram Policy Update: How to Report Illegal Content in Private Chats?

Telegram is the most renowned social media platform, known for its willingness to provide the utmost privacy to users and its consistent support to the crypto industry. Despite many countries’ governance objecting to its working approach, the platform has never bowed to any until now, as the Telegram policy update shows significant changes in CEO Pavel Durov’s beliefs.

These updates are linked to Pavel Durov release after an earlier arrest and four-day detention in France due to his failure to control the spread of illicit content on the platform. Pavel has been in the spotlight by many government agencies and was arrested last month for investigation. And recently, the Telegram CEO Released a statement on French detention, revealing that the platform cooperates with the EU request and takes down millions of harmful posts. And this new policy update also seems to be part of that.

Telegram Policy Update Shares Steps To Report Illegal Content

Recently, a famous X account, db, highlighted the Telegram policy update on illegal content. The X post highlighted the difference in one particular question from the FAQs, which says. “There’s illegal content on the Telegram. How do I take it down?”

To which the previous answer stated that private chats are off-limits, but the new answer provides the steps on how to report it. “All Telegram Chats and Bots are private amongst their participants. We do not process any requests related to them,” read the previous answers.

However, with the new policy update, the new answer to the query is,

All Telegram apps have ‘Report’ buttons that let you flag illegal content for our moderators — in just a few taps, followed by the steps to do that.

Interestingly, this shows the platform’s incline towards working in illegal content removal after the arrest. However, it is also concerning for the users as to how many more changes might happen in the upcoming days. Another concerning news is of Vitalik Buterin on a selling spree, as another prominent crypto celebrity is changing its moves in the industry.

Steps To Report Illegal Content On Telegram

The Telegram policy updates have provided quite simple steps towards reporting illicit content on the platform. The steps of the illegal content reporting are as follows: –

• On Telegram for Android, tap the message and select Report from the menu.
• On iOS, press and hold the message and select the same.
• On Desktop, Web, or Telegram for macOS, right-click on the message and select Report.

For every selection, the user needs to put an appropriate reason for reporting it. Moreover, the platform has also provided an email address, “abuse@telegram.org” to put it for the automated takedown. Here, the user needs to include the links to the illegal content that the user wants to report.

Additionally, the platform has asked the EU users to study their guidelines to find the relevant reporting options, indicating the stricter regulations from the EU particularly.

Final Thoughts

In his first official post after detention, Pavel Durov revealed that Telegram has had its share of challenges due to its rapid growth. It comes from having a user base of 950 Million, which made it easier for the bad actor to run illegal content, but now the platform is working on that internally. Additionally, the Telegram policy update has revealed the inclusion of new regulations around illegal content, as instead of answering that personal chats are off limits, the social media platform has added steps to report illegal content.