Turkish authorities are looking to ban social media and messaging platform Telegram, according to local media familiar with the matter.
Takvim, a Turkish daily newspaper, is the most widely cited source reporting on the developments. According to the outlet, Turkish authorities are concerned about criminal activity conducted over the platform.
Causing particular worry for Turkey is the use of Telegram messaging services for drug dealing, facilitating prostitution and running illegal gambling networks. Services are apparently paid for via cash in hand or through digital methods, chiefly IBAN and cryptocurrency.
Proceeds from these criminal activities will then, for the most part, have to be laundered. Although Takvim has not outlined whether this is a concern for Turkish authorities, it would be hard to imagine that law enforcement is not alarmed about where the finances from drug dealing and other criminal exploits will end up.
Turkey’s Information and Communication Technologies Authority (ICTA) seems to be the government agency most preoccupied with clamping down on Telegram. ICTA has apparently been sending messages to Telegram’s London HQ, due to the platform not having any representatives in Turkey, but according to BTS there has been no response.
Should Turkey block Telegram, this would mark its second major social media clampdown of the year. Earlier this month the government blocked Instagram, accusing the platform of censoring posts relating to the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict.
The potential action against Telegram is far less political in nature and relates more to, as outlined above, concerns around criminality. Turkey is hardly the first government to express these worries about the platform.
Telegram’s use by various militant groups, although also used by pro-democracy organisations in some countries, has alarmed many governments. These have been further compounded by allegations of the platform’s use for illegal activities, like the ones discussed above.
For payments stakeholders, social media’s role in facilitating fraud has worried some. In the UK, for example, various banks have pointed to the use of Facebook and other platforms for perpetrating fraud and scams.
Although Telegram has not been singled out in these cases, it has still been mentioned. In a discussion with Payment Expert at Money20/20, Logan Porter, Director of Solution Engineering at SEON, an AI-based fraud prevention business, highlighted how some fraudsters sell tools of their trade via Telegram channels.
“There are places on say, the dark web, for example, or telegram channels, where these fraudsters are selling the tools to do this and they’re selling courses on how to do these things. It’s very sophisticated,” he said.
The blame cannot be entirely pinned on Telegram, however. The app has been very transparent about its efforts to clamp down on illegal activity, shutting down channels and pages used to share and distribute illegal content and products.
Additionally, many criminals do not use Telegram and instead prefer other options, which in some cases appear homemade. Just last week, the UK’s National Crime Agency announced that it had busted ‘Russian Coms’, a global fraud facilitation service which provided subscribers with a headset or an app to carry out their crimes.