Tag: Telegram

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Telegram introduces a Power Saving Mode for battery preservation

Telegram has introduced a new Power Saving Mode to preserve the battery of your device. The mode kicks in when the battery dips below a certain percentage — which is configurable — and turns off resource-intensive features like auto-playing videos and GIFs, sticker animations, and background updates.

The new feature has its own menu in settings, which also has individual toggles for auto-playing videos, GIFs, sticker animations, emoji animations, interface effects, preloading media, and background updates (for iOS only). Users can turn these off permanently to save battery. The company said that it tested more than 200 Android phones and created “optimized default settings” for them.

Telegram Power saving mode

Image Credits: Telegram

Notably, WhatsApp doesn’t have a power saver mode, but it has settings to disable auto-download of media to save battery and storage.

Apart from the new battery-saving mode, Telegram has also rolled out a playback speed control for videos in chat. You can choose default speeds like 0.5x,1x,1.5x, and 2x, or use the slider to choose a custom speed.

Telegram playback speed

Image Credits: Telegram

What’s more, Telegram is introducing an auto-invite group links feature. When you are selecting people to join a group, if they have disabled auto-joining, they will be sent an invite link.

Along with this, Telegram is also pushing features like read time for messages in groups with less than 100 members, new animated emojis and interactive reactions, translated bot descriptions, and improved folder support on iOS.

These features are rolling out to all users with the latest Telegram update.

Last year, Telegram launched a premium subscription for $5 a month in June with features like exclusive stickers and reactions, and the ability to upload large files. In December, the company said that it had crossed the mark of 1 million paying users.

Telegram introduces a Power Saving Mode for battery preservation by Ivan Mehta originally published on TechCrunch

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Telegram is auctioning phone numbers to let users sign up to the service without any SIM

After putting unique usernames on the auction on the TON blockchain, Telegram is now putting anonymous numbers up for bidding. These numbers could be used to sign up for Telegram without needing any SIM card.

Just like the username auction, you can buy these virtual numbers on Fragment, which is a site specially created for Telegram-related auctions. To buy a number, you will have to link your TON wallet (Tonkeeper) to the website.

You can buy a random number for as low as 9 toncoins, which is equivalent to roughly $16.50 at the time of writing. Some of the premium virtual numbers — such as +888-8-888 — are selling for 31,500 toncoins (~$58,200).

Telegram virtual numbers

How Telegram virtual numbers work Image Credits: Telegram

Notably, you can only use this number to sign up for Telegram. You can’t use it to receive SMS or calls or use it to register for another service.

For Telegram, this is another way of asking its most loyal supporters to support the app by helping it make some money. The company launched its premium subscription plan earlier this year. On Tuesday, the chat app’s founder Pavel Durov said that Telegram has more than 1 million paid users just a few months after the launch of its premium features. While Telegram offers features like cross-device sync and large groups, it’s important to remember that chats are not protected by end-to-end encryption.

As for folks who want anonymization, Telegram already offers you to hide your phone number. Alternatively, there are tons of virtual phone number services out there — including Google Voice, Hushed, and India-based Doosra — that allow you receive calls and SMS as well.

Telegram is auctioning phone numbers to let users sign up to the service without any SIM by Ivan Mehta originally published on TechCrunch

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Telegram Premium tops 1 million subscribers

Telegram Premium has amassed over 1 million subscribers, less than six months after the popular instant messaging app launched the paid offering and began a serious effort to monetize the business.

Pavel Durov shared the update on his Telegram channel Tuesday, calling the milestone “one of the most successful examples of a social media subscription plan ever launched.”

The subscription, however, still “represents just a fraction of Telegram’s overall revenue,” he shared in the same update, optimistically hoping that one day Premium will rake in just as much money as ads.

The app, used by over 700 million monthly active users, launched Premium in late June, offering customers a range of additional features such as the ability to send files as large as 4 GB and faster downloads. The monthly subscription costs about $6 in the U.S. and the UK, and $2.2 in emerging markets such as India.

Telegram’s push to monetization comes at a time when its chief rival, WhatsApp, is also scrambling to find ways to make money. WhatsApp remains free and has no paid tier, but its parent firm Meta is increasingly bringing businesses to the instant messaging app. The firm appears to have dialled up its effort in recent months — and not everyone is happy about it.

The Dubai-headquartered Telegram, which has said in the past that it needed to make money to keep the platform afloat, citing computing costs, plans to expand its monetization efforts next year, Durov said. The firm is developing a host of decentralized tools, including non-custodial wallets and exchanges, he said late last month.

“Thanks to successful monetization, Telegram will be able to pay for the servers, traffic and wages necessary to keep building new features and supporting existing ones. While some other apps consider their users a tool to maximize revenue, we consider revenue a tool to maximize value for our users,” he wrote Tuesday.

Telegram Premium tops 1 million subscribers by Manish Singh originally published on TechCrunch

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Telegram Premium tops 1 million subscribers

Telegram Premium has amassed over 1 million subscribers, less than six months after the popular instant messaging app launched the paid offering and began a serious effort to monetize the business.

Pavel Durov shared the update on his Telegram channel Tuesday, calling the milestone “one of the most successful examples of a social media subscription plan ever launched.”

The subscription, however, still “represents just a fraction of Telegram’s overall revenue,” he shared in the same update, optimistically hoping that one day Premium will rake in just as much money as ads.

The app, used by over 700 million monthly active users, launched Premium in late June, offering customers a range of additional features such as the ability to send files as large as 4 GB and faster downloads. The monthly subscription costs about $6 in the U.S. and the UK, and $2.2 in emerging markets such as India.

Telegram’s push to monetization comes at a time when its chief rival, WhatsApp, is also scrambling to find ways to make money. WhatsApp remains free and has no paid tier, but its parent firm Meta is increasingly bringing businesses to the instant messaging app. The firm appears to have dialled up its effort in recent months — and not everyone is happy about it.

The Dubai-headquartered Telegram, which has said in the past that it needed to make money to keep the platform afloat, citing computing costs, plans to expand its monetization efforts next year, Durov said. The firm is developing a host of decentralized tools, including non-custodial wallets and exchanges, he said late last month.

“Thanks to successful monetization, Telegram will be able to pay for the servers, traffic and wages necessary to keep building new features and supporting existing ones. While some other apps consider their users a tool to maximize revenue, we consider revenue a tool to maximize value for our users,” he wrote Tuesday.

Telegram Premium tops 1 million subscribers by Manish Singh originally published on TechCrunch

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Telegram shares data of users accused of copyright violation following court order

Telegram has disclosed names of administrators, their phone numbers and IP addresses of channels accused of copyright infringement in compliance with a court order in India in a remarkable illustration of the data the instant messaging platform stores on its users and can be made to disclose by authorities.

The app operator was forced to shared the data after a teacher sued the firm for not doing enough to prevent unauthorised distribution of her course material on the platform. Neetu Singh, the plaintiff teacher, said a number of Telegram channels were re-selling her study materials without permission at discounted prices.

An Indian court earlier had ordered Telegram to adhere to the Indian law and disclose details about those operating such channels.

Telegram unsuccessfully argued that disclosing user information would violate the privacy policy and the laws of Singapore, where it has located its physical servers for storing users data. In response, the Indian court said the copyright owners couldn’t be left “completely remediless against the actual infringers” because Telegram has chosen to locate its servers outside the country.

In an order last week, Justice Prathiba Singh said Telegram had complied with the earlier order and shared the data.

“Let copy of the said data be supplied to Id. Counsel for plaintiffs with the clear direction that neither the plaintiffs nor their counsel shall disclose the said data to any third party, except for the purposes of the present proceedings. To this end, disclosure to the governmental authorities/police is permissible,” said the court (PDF) and first reported by LiveLaw.

A Telegram spokesperson declined to say whether the app operator shared private data.

“Telegram stores very limited or no data on its users. In most cases, we can’t even access any user data without specific entry points, and we believe this was the case here. Consequently, we can’t confirm that any private data has been shared in this instance,” Telegram spokesperson Remi Vaughn told TechCrunch.

India is one of the largest markets for Telegram, which has amassed nearly 150 million users in the South Asian market.

Telegram shares data of users accused of copyright violation following court order by Manish Singh originally published on TechCrunch

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Telegram announces username auctions on TON blockchain

Telegram announced today that will it hold an auction for usernames — for both individual accounts and channels — through a marketplace built on top of the TON blockchain.

In August, Telegram founder Pavel Durov first mentioned the idea by noting the possibility of adding “a little bit of Web 3.0 to Telegram in the coming weeks.” At that time, he said he was impressed by the success of the TON Foundation’s auction of domain names.

“I’m really impressed by the success of the auction TON recently conducted for their domain/wallet names. Wallet.ton was sold for 215,250 Toncoin (~$260000) while casino.ton was sold for ~$244000.

If TON has been able to achieve these results, imagine how successful Telegram with its 700 million users could be if we put reserved @ usernames, group and channel links for auction,” he said. Now the company is putting this plan into action.

Telegram and TON Foundation are using a separate website Fragment.com as a hub for these auctions. Users will be able to log into the site using Telegram, the tonkeeper app, or their TON-based wallets. The website will also help users link their Telegram accounts to the handles that they have bought.

At launch, the chat app is auctioning four and five-character handles that will be available for everyone. Telegram users can also put up their own existing handles for auction. Each handle put up for auction will end in a week with an extra hour for final bidding. The company is setting a minimum auction value for four character handles at 10,000 toncoins — which converts to roughly $18,400 at the time of writing.

“For the first time, social media users will be able to transparently prove that they own their handles thanks to their tokenisation on the TON blockchain,” Andrew Rogozov, Founding Member of the TON Foundation said in a statement

Telegram had big ambitions in the web3 world but it had to ditch those ambitions. In 2018, the company hatched up plans for Telegram Open Network (TON) blockchain project and an initial coin offering (ICO). The project got backing from big-name investors including Benchmark and Lightspeed Capital, which put up $1.7 billion. However, after a legal battle with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Telegram was forced to forsake the project.

After Telegram stopped working on TON, various independent groups continued the development with Toncoin getting backing from Durov and winning the rights to ton.org website in 2021. But the Telegram founder has tried to distance himself from direct involvement with the project.

Telegram has been trying various methods to earn money to keep the company sustainable. Last year it introduced ad spots on public channels. Earlier this year, the company introduced a paid plan that allows large file transfers, exclusive stickers and reactions, and the ability to convert voice messages into text. The new announcement of username auction on the blockchain is another step to get some more moolah in the bank.

Telegram announces username auctions on TON blockchain by Ivan Mehta originally published on TechCrunch

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Telegram cuts subscription fee by more than half in India

Telegram has cut the monthly subscription fee for its premium tier by more than half in India, just months after introducing the offering as it attempts to aggressively cash in on a large user base in one of its biggest markets.

In a message to users in India on Saturday, Telegram said it was making the subscription available in the country at a discount. The monthly subscription now costs customers 179 Indian rupees ($2.2), down from 469 Indian rupees ($5.74) earlier. The app’s monthly subscription, called Telegram Premium, costs between $4.99 to $6 in every other market.

Users who have not received the message are also seeing the new price in the settings section of the app, they said and TechCrunch independently verified.

India is one of the largest markets for Telegram. The instant messaging app has amassed over 120 million monthly active users in the country, according to analytics firm data.ai. (An industry executive shared the figures with TechCrunch.) That figure makes the app the second most popular in its category in the country, only second to WhatsApp, which has courted over half a billion users in the South Asian market.

Telegram, which claims to have amassed over 700 million monthly active users globally, introduced the optional subscription offering in June this year in a move it hopes will improve its finances and continuing to support a free tier. Premium customers gain access to a wide-range of additional features such as the ability to follow up to 1,000 channels, send larger files (4GB) and faster download speeds.

The Dubai-headquartered firm joins a list of global tech firms that offer their services for lower cost in India. Apple’s music app charges $1.2 for the individual monthly plan in the country, whereas Netflix’s offerings starts at as low as $1.83 in the country.

Telegram cuts subscription fee by more than half in India by Manish Singh originally published on TechCrunch

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Indian court orders Telegram to disclose details of channels violating copyright

An Indian court has ordered the messaging app Telegram to disclose the details of channels involved in a copyright infringement case in the country after Telegram argued, unsuccessfully, that doing so would violate its privacy policy with users.

This is not the first time that the app has come under fire because of its privacy policy. The app has gained some notoriety after critics said it enabled extremist groups to communicate and grow their numbers. And in Brazil earlier this year, a court ordered Apple and Google to remove Telegram from their app stores because of how it was being used to spread misinformation. (The latter ban was lifted in three days after Telegram complied with removal requests.)

But this latest case appears to be the first time that Telegram has been ordered by a court to disclose user data specifically related to copyright infringement anywhere, and the first time an Indian court has ordered any app to disclose data related to copyright infringement.

The Delhi High Court directed the Dubai-headquartered firm to submit the details, such as mobile numbers, IP addresses and email IDs, used for uploading infringing content while hearing a lawsuit filed by a teacher against the messaging app and people involved in sharing her copyrighted study material.

Telegram argued that disclosing user information would violate its privacy policy and the laws of Singapore, where it has located its physical servers for storing user data.

However, the court has responded to the argument and said that copyright owners couldn’t be left “completely remediless against the actual infringers” because Telegram has chosen to locate its servers in Singapore.

Telegram didn’t respond to a request for a comment on the order.

In the filing with the court, the complainant named Neetu Singh submitted a list of channels circulating her lectures and books on competitive exams. The channels were selling the content at discounted prices, the complainant said.

“If there are any further list[s] of infringing channels, the same [must] be also submitted to Telegram within one week. The data relating to the infringing channels and the details as to the devices/servers/networks on which they are created, their creators, operators including any phone numbers, IP addresses, email addresses, used for this purpose shall be disclosed by Telegram within a period of two weeks thereafter,” the 51-page order (PDF) said.

Telegram, which counts India as its largest market, amassed over 700 million users in June. At the time, it also launched a premium tier to monetise its growth against the likes of WhatsApp and Signal.

The public claims made by Telegram to prioritize user privacy helped it to gain the attention of many Indian users amid growing negative sentiment against WhatsApp due to the latter’s 2021 privacy policy update. However, the Meta-owned app has so far maintained its domination in the South Asian market.

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WhatsApp confirms some users have access to its new group discussions feature, WhatsApp Communities

WhatsApp Communities, the messaging app’s anticipated expansion aimed at supporting larger discussion groups, has now rolled out to additional users as it nears a public launch. The company declined to share specific details as to how many users or which countries were seeing the new feature as testing expands, but confirmed that more users have now been given early access.

First announced in April, WhatsApp Communities is a significant attempt to re-create the popularity of Facebook’s Groups within a messaging app environment. Created by the app’s end users, communities include features designed to add structure to larger group chats such as support for file sharing, 32-person group calls, emoji reactions, as well as admin tools and moderation controls, among other things.

In addition to capitalizing on WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption and users’ growing desire to network within private communities outside of larger social networks, WhatsApp Communities also present a challenge to other messaging apps that have grown in popularity, like Telegram. The feature could also appeal to clubs or organizations that today engage in group chats across private platforms and apps like Apple’s iMessage, GroupMe, Band, Remind and others.

What makes the feature appealing to larger groups is that not all the discussions take place in a single chat, which can get busy. Instead, only admins have the ability to share announcements to all Community members through the main announcement group, which can support thousands of users. Meanwhile, members can chat in smaller sub-groups that admins have created or approved.

Unlike Facebook Groups, WhatsApp Communities aren’t public or discoverable on the platform. Users have to be invited to a Community in order to join.

Image Credits: WhatsApp screenshot via WABetaInfo

According to reports by sites including Android Police and WABetaInfo, some WhatsApp beta testers were newly reporting they had gained the ability to create a community in the app. The reports noted that the ability to hide your phone number from other sub-group members wasn’t immediately supported — though it’s expected to be available when the feature publicly launches.

However, the reports claimed it was WhatsApp beta app users who were gaining access to this feature. This isn’t quite accurate, we understand. WhatsApp clarified to TechCrunch it’s the full feature that’s rolling out to a small number of users in a few countries at the moment.

The company declined to share which countries were among those with access but at least one report claims that Malaysia is among them.

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Telegram founder wants to explore web3-based auctions for custom usernames

Telegram founder Pavel Durov said Monday that he wants to integrate web3 into the messaging app.

Durov said on his Telegram channel that he was impressed by the TON project — an independent project not affiliated with Telegram — and how it is used for domain name/wallet auctions. He noted that Telegram can replicate TON’s auction on the app by putting custom usernames, group, and channel links on the auction on blockchain — just like NFTs.

Blockchain-based domain naming systems like the Ethereum Name Service (ENS) and Solana Bonafida naming service have found popularity with Unstoppable Domain recently reaching unicorn status. If Telegram goes ahead with it, the custom link NFTs could be another way to earn revenue apart from ads and subscription services.

The Telegram founder also mentioned that the company is “inclined to try out TON” as a blockchain of choice for Telegram given its familiarity with the technology. The chat app already allows users to send toncoin to each other directly within the app. So an NFT marketplace based on that seems like a probable next step for web3 integration.

But it also comes with notable blockchain stumbles, too. A few years ago, the chat app also abandoned a TON blockchain project. In 2018, the company explored plans for Telegram Open Network (TON) blockchain project and a mega initial coin offering (ICO). The project gathered a lot of interest from various investors including Benchmark and Lightspeed Capital who put up $1.7 billion. However, after a legal fight with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Telegram was forced to abandon the project.

After Telegram stopped working on TON, various independent groups continued the development with Toncoin getting backing from Durov and winning the rights to ton.org website in 2021.

Here is Durov’s full message:

I’m really impressed by the success of the auction TON recently conducted for their domain/wallet names. Wallet.ton was sold for 215,250 Toncoin (~$260000) while casino.ton was sold for ~$244000.

If TON has been able to achieve these results, imagine how successful Telegram with its 700 million users could be if we put reserved @ usernames, group and channel links for auction. In addition to millions of catchy t.me addresses like @storm or @royal, all four-letter usernames could be made available for sale (@bank, @club, @game, @gift etc).

This would create a new platform where username holders could transfer them to interested parties in protected deals – with ownership secured on the blockchain via NFT-like smart-contracts. Other elements of the Telegram ecosystem, including channels, stickers or emoji, could later also become part of this marketplace.

When it comes to scalability and speed, TON probably has the best technology to host such decentralized sales. Our team can write bullet-proof smart contracts for TON (since it was us who invented its smart-contract language), so we are inclined to try out TON as the underlying blockchain for our future marketplace.

Let’s see if we can add a little bit of Web 3.0 to Telegram in the coming weeks.