IN FOCUS: We reported 20 illegal groups to Telegram. Most were still online 2 weeks later

SINGAPORE: All it took was using the right keywords – fast cash, vape, SG, Geylang – to open up a criminal underworld on messaging app Telegram.

There were dozens of groups and channels, some with thousands of subscribers selling e-cigarettes, buying Singpass or bank accounts, and offering sex services.

Others collected orders for prescription drugs, advertised exotic pets for sale and offered to create fake medical certificates.

All these activities are illegal in Singapore.

Among the biggest groups were those offering sex services. Administrators posted pictures of women – sometimes in revealing clothing or suggestive poses – along with their height, weight and other details.

Rates and the women’s working hours were also included in the messages.

In one channel that had nearly 13,000 subscribers, administrators also put up screengrabs of conversations with customers.

“She is so good,” one customer wrote. “100000/10.”

REPORTING THE TELEGRAM GROUPS

The apparent lack of moderation of content on the app has come into sharp focus after Telegram’s founder and CEO Pavel Durov was arrested in France on Aug 24.

He was charged with several counts of failing to curb extremist and illegal content on Telegram. 

Durov is also accused of refusing to share documents with the authorities, as well as offences related to child pornography, drug trafficking, fraud and money laundering.

In Singapore, people have been arrested for illegal activities on Telegram, such as distributing sexual content or selling drugs.

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) told CNA on Saturday (Sep 21) that it is "very concerned" about the potential use of Telegram for criminal activities such as scams, and is engaging the platform regularly.

"Telegram has responded positively in a few areas, but not others," said the ministry.

"We would like them to step up their efforts in the same way that other online services have stepped up to counter criminal activities on their platforms.

"We are continuing to engage them even as we contemplate further steps we can take under our legislation."

In late August, this reporter shortlisted a few groups, including three that sold vapes. They had between 18,000 and 26,000 subscribers each and were all active.

The next day, the three vape groups could not be accessed.

Instead of seeing messages on the channels, there was a notice from Telegram that read: “This group can’t be displayed because it violated local laws.”

It seemed promising – as if Telegram was taking the issue of illegal content seriously.

But there was no lack of illegal groups. On Aug 29, I reported 20 groups and channels to see if they would be taken down as well.

Most of them had thousands of subscribers, and almost all were actively posting. They sold drugs and vapes, offered medical licences and certificates, as well as put up advertisements offering sex services.

They were all channels or public groups, meaning any Telegram user could access the messages without joining.

Reporting them to Telegram was easy. There were categories to choose from – spam, fake account, violence, pornography, child abuse, copyright issues and others. You could also type out a reason for reporting the group.

After submitting the report, a notification at the bottom of the screen would pop up, saying: “Telegram moderators will review your report. Thank you!”

But two and a half weeks later, there was no response from Telegram. Of the 20 reported, 17 were still up and running. 

Those groups were not stagnant either. In half a month, one channel offering sex services grew by 3,300 subscribers, while another selling exotic pets gained around 300 more users.

Members of the exotic pets group posted messages daily. Among the animals offered were raccoons, marmosets – a type of monkey originally found in Brazil – and sugar gliders, a type of possum.

Sugar gliders are on the Animal and Veterinary Service’s list of animals that cannot be kept as pets. 

Also on the list are snakes, tarantulas, hedgehogs and scorpions – all of which were readily available for sale or pre-orders in the Telegram group.

Some of the animals being offered in the group, such as the harlequin gecko, are classified as endangered, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species.

Besides exotic animals, vape groups also grew – one gained 200 members in those two weeks. 

The administrators offered promotions and bulk offers, as well as free delivery to buyers in Singapore.

CNA asked Telegram about its moderation process and how the app processed reports of illegal content.

Telegram spokesperson Remi Vaughn said moderators do not provide feedback on the outcome of users’ reports.

“But every report is examined and any content that breaches Telegram’s terms is removed,” he said. 

He did not respond to a question about how long it took for a user’s report to be looked at.

The spokesperson added that moderators monitor the "public parts" of Telegram proactively and also rely on artificial intelligence tools and user reports to remove content that breaches its terms of service.

"This moderation team is made up of hundreds of contracted professionals whose reach and capabilities are extended with AI tools," he said. 

Mr Vaughn added that strengthening moderation capabilities is Telegram’s priority for the remainder of the year. 

"Telegram is currently expanding its moderation teams and the range of organisations it cooperates with to combat abuse of its platform and enrich its moderation data sets with third-party data," he said.

WHY CRIME THRIVES ON TELEGRAM

Telegram aims to create a "truly free messenger", the app says in its frequently asked questions on its website.

The two most important components of internet privacy should be protecting private conversations from third parties and protecting personal data from marketers and advertisers, it added.

Its secret chat function uses end-to-end encryption and supports self-destructing messages.

WhatsApp also uses end-to-end encryption, but given that it is part of the Meta family, there have been concerns over the way it would handle user data, said Professor Crystal Abidin, a digital anthropologist at Curtin University.

“There was some mistrust with the veracity and the privacy on WhatsApp and the credibility of the app, the integrity of it,” she said.

Telegram was the app of choice for protesters to organise demonstrations without fear of their data being handed over to the authorities, she noted.

But such features can also be exploited, said Prof Crystal.

“Given all the wonderful promises of safety and encryption, it is no surprise to hear that the app – like many other apps, to be fair – is not really taking responsibility for the contents and the user practices,” she added.

Associate Professor Jiow Hee Jhee of the Singapore Institute of Technology said that as society becomes more digitised, it is no surprise that criminal activities are also moving online.

“Criminal activities can take place anywhere, any social media (or) communication app,” he said. 

“If there are features that afford anonymity and the ability to reach a large audience size, it becomes attractive for criminal activities. I understand that Telegram affords such features,” he added.

Groups on Telegram can have up to 200,000 people, while channels can broadcast to an unlimited audience size.

In recent years, one notable case was a chat group called SG Nasi Lemak, where obscene materials were circulated.

These included upskirt photos, videos of women in states of undress, and hidden camera footage of women in toilets and changing rooms.

According to court documents, the group was created in November 2018 and grew to about 44,000 members.

To remain in the group, users had to actively take part and upload or share such obscene material.

In 2019, the police received dozens of reports and arrested four suspects. One of them, Liong Tianwei, posted advertisements for sex workers in the SG Nasi Lemak group and received weekly cash payments

All four have been dealt with in court.

Telegram is also used to buy and sell controlled drugs. The Central Narcotics Bureau said that this has been going on since 2019.

The authority told CNA last year that it had arrested more than 500 drug offenders who used Telegram for their illegal activities.

Dr Ozan Kuru, an assistant professor in the National University of Singapore’s Department of Communications and New Media, said apps like Telegram provide more anonymity and encrypted messaging than social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram. 

Messaging apps are seen as more private and that contributes to the “online disinhibition effect”, he said.

“Disinhibition means that with increased anonymity, instant messaging speed as well as complex mechanisms of social trust, users feel less restraint and reconsideration in posting and sharing content,” he said.

Telegram said on its website that it processes legitimate requests to take down illegal content if it is public.

“Please note that this does not apply to local restrictions on freedom of speech. For example, if criticising the government is illegal in some country, Telegram won't be a part of such politically motivated censorship.”

It added that it does block terrorist bots and channels, but will not block those who peacefully express alternative opinions.

ENGAGING TELEGRAM

In Singapore, the government has expressed difficulty in getting Telegram to cooperate with local authorities.

In November 2023, Minister of State for Home Affairs Sun Xueling said Telegram had not responded to requests by the police to remove access to accounts sharing sexually explicit content.

Earlier that month, Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam said the app had not responded to police requests to remove scam accounts and posts.

In response to CNA's queries, MHA said on Saturday that it has been engaging Telegram on its compliance with directions and other safeguards under the Online Criminal Harms Act (OCHA) to protect users from crime.

In the first half of this year, the number of scam cases perpetrated on Telegram was up 137.5 per cent compared with the same period last year.

Of the 8,336 scam cases where criminals contacted victims via messaging apps, 45 per cent used Telegram, according to the police’s mid-year brief.

Those personally affected by scammers may have found it difficult to get support from Telegram.

Mr Robin Hicks, who works as an editor, started getting messages last month from people saying he was on Telegram, or at least someone using his phone number was. 

“What's interesting was that the avatar that they used to present themselves as me was a different gender. It was a young woman,” he said. 

The scammer, masquerading as Mr Hicks, approached people – including his business contacts – claiming he was in a tight financial situation and asked to borrow money.

After finding out about the scam, Mr Hicks tried to gain control of the account, but failed because login codes are sent to the account rather than via SMS.

He asked his friends who use Telegram to report the account and he also emailed the platform to take down the account. 

In his email, he included screenshots of the fake account and conversations between the scammer and his contacts.

But he didn’t get a response from Telegram.

“There wasn’t even an automated response to say, hey, we’re looking into it,” he said. “Nothing at all.”

The person pretending to be him continued to engage with his contacts for about a week or two.

“Thankfully, a lot of the contacts realised it was a hoax or a scam account because it so obviously wasn’t me,” he said, adding that there were Finnish words used in the biography of the account linked to his number.

“I think it would have been more of an issue if they used, say, a picture from my LinkedIn account or another social media account.”

Still, it was stressful not to hear back from Telegram, especially since the scammer had reached out to his work contacts. 

“It was fairly obvious it’s a scammer, but if (the picture used) was more similar to me, it could have been potentially career wrecking.”

More than a month later, he still has not heard anything from Telegram. He only found out the account was gone because some friends helped to check on it.

Ms Gabrielle See, Mr Hicks’ colleague and a long-time user of Telegram, said she expected the app to respond to such requests more quickly.

“My impression of (Telegram) is that it was very focused on security and its users. I think I just expected it to do better - at least better than WhatsApp,” said Ms See. 

Anecdotally, she said WhatsApp seems to respond to scam groups quite quickly, sometimes even before she reports them.

When Ms See first started using Telegram, she felt that it was proactive in communicating with its audience and that it regularly rolled out new features for its users.

Mr Hicks’ experience has caused her to lose some of her appreciation for Telegram.

WHAT CAN BE DONE?

After Durov’s arrest, he posted on his channel that the app takes down millions of harmful posts and channels every day.

“The claims in some media that Telegram is some sort of anarchic paradise are absolutely untrue,” he said.

But he added that the app acknowledges feedback that Telegram is not doing enough. 

“Telegram’s abrupt increase in user count to 950 (million) caused growing pains that made it easier for criminals to abuse our platform,” he wrote. “That’s why I made it my personal goal to ensure we significantly improve things in this regard.” 

The process has started internally, he added.

On Sep 3, South Korean news agency Yonhap reported that Telegram removed some illegal pornographic material following a request by regulators.

Durov also wrote in another message that 99.999 per cent of users have nothing to do with crime, but the 0.001 per cent involved in illicit activities create a bad image for the platform.

“That’s why this year we are committed to turn moderation on Telegram from an area of criticism into one of praise,” he said.

Several countries have reportedly blocked Telegram at times - Thailand banned the app after it was used to organise anti-government protests in 2020, while Iran also blocked the platform, blaming it for facilitating demonstrations in 2017.

In Germany, the government considered banning Telegram after finding channels that potentially violated local laws against hate speech. It eventually fined the operators instead.

Some of the crimes perpetrated on Telegram can be prosecuted in Singapore under the Women’s Charter or Computer Misuse Act.

Under the Broadcasting Act, authorities can order messaging apps to disable access to egregious online content, except where it is deemed to be "of a private or domestic nature".

The Infocomm Media Development Authority has been notifying Telegram and requesting the removal of child sexual exploitation material and material on illegal drugs found on its open channels. Telegram has complied with these requests, said MHA.

Mr Cory Wong, director at Invictus Law Corporation, said authorities in Singapore could also technically disable Telegram’s service under the Online Criminal Harms Act.

The Act allows authorities to issue directions to online service providers, including Telegram, to disable access to accounts or content that are involved in scams and other crimes, such as sexually explicit materials, drugs and extortion.

Telegram is also required to implement the appropriate systems, processes or measures - such as proactive detection - to counter scams and malicious cyber activities.

Mr Wong said he is not sure how far Singapore would go in acting against Telegram.

He said the situation is not severe enough for Singapore to go “all out, to go ballistic” against Telegram.

Many users in Singapore - including those who likely use it legitimately - would also be affected by such a ban.

Telegram was the fifth most used social media platform in Singapore as of last year, with 47.8 per cent of internet users aged 16 to 64 using the app each month, according to a study conducted by We Are Social and Meltwater.

It was one of the most downloaded apps in 2023, second only to TikTok.

However, if the strategy is to just shut down illegal Telegram groups, it could be a never-ending process. 

As with many of these groups, as soon as one is closed, another is set up just as quickly.

After the administrators of the SG Nasi Lemak Telegram group were arrested and the group shut down, other groups of a similar nature popped up on the app.

Last week, an administrator on one of the groups selling vapes warned users that “many of our peers” were being targeted by authorities.

It said its old channel could no longer be accessed by Singapore phone numbers and instead pointed to – yet another – newly created channel.