MANILA, Philippines – In a recent interview with DZRH’s Dos Por Dos, DICT Secretary Henry Aguda was considering a government ban on the Telegram app due to the platform’s reputation for the proliferation of pornography and scams.
Telegram is a multi-platform messaging app that has gained popularity in recent years as an alternative messaging app to Viber, Messenger, and WhatsApp. Telegram users have the ability to hide their own phone numbers and instead display a username. Because Telegram operates with this extra layer of anonimity, users can have several Telegram profiles in one phone.
Aguda said that the DICT has been meeting with other social networking platforms like Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp to find ways to curb online pornography, financial scams, and deepfake content. Telegram has been associated as the preferred platform for these activities to proliferate due to the secretive nature of its user-base.
“Ayon ang napag-agreehan namin na non-negotiable. Ito bantayan niyo ngayon sa social media sabihin n’yo sa akin kung nakikita n’yo na one, online sexual exploitation and abuse of children. Sabi ko kapag may nakita pa ‘kong isa, magalit na sa akin ang magalit pero iboblock ko sila.” (What we have agreed on is non-negotiable. If we see online sexual exploitation and abuse of children on these platforms, people can get mad at me but I will still have these platforms blocked.)
According to Eli Rabadon, co-founder of DVCode, a blockchain development software company, “History tells us something simple: that bad actors don’t disappear, they migrade. Encryption is not the enemy. It protects journalists. It protects whistleblowers. It protects ordinary citizens from identity theft. Once you normalize platform bans as first response, you create uncertainty in the digital ecosystem.”
Aguda said that the DICT has been coordinating closely with the PNP and the NBI to combat bad actors online as the Philippines has been plagued with financial scams, usually in the form of social engineering as the main method hackers gain control of online accounts.