Are Telegram and Signal Havens for Right-Wing Extremists?
accounts. This step drastically curtailed the Islamic State’s ability to use Telegram’s encrypted messaging. Along the way, the company—which long rejected cooperating with law enforcement—developed a collaborative relationship with Europol, the European Union’s transnational investigative force. Formally known as the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation, Europol investigators encouraged Telegram to remove Islamic State content without resorting to the heavy-handed legal measures against which the company has been so allergic.
The purge of the Islamic State from Telegram crippled the terrorist organization’s ability to spread propaganda and secretly communicate within the platform’s encrypted functions. Feldstein and Gordon write that Telegram could never access the private communications of Islamic State members, but “it could identify violent extremist users based on their presence in channels that posted content violating its terms of service, which in turn provided an avenue to scrape users from the platform. In this way, Telegram proved it could deftly balance its commitment to privacy while rejecting violent extremist content.”
Feldstein and Gordon note that since the right-wing insurrection on Jan. 6, there are now similar concerns in the United States that violent extremist groups will exploit Telegram to secretly coordinate attacks. “Since the attack, Telegram has already shut down what it says are “dozens” of channels calling for violence against the U.S. government or advocating for ethnic cleansing, neo-Nazism, or guerrilla warfare.”
The handling of the Islamic State by Telegram provides valuable lessons for how encrypted platform can deal with extremist and violent groups.
First, it demonstrates that Telegram, if it so desires, can monitor and remove violent content without compromising its encrypted messaging functions. Second, the Telegram-IS case shows how law enforcement agencies can form an effective partnership with Telegram in spite of the company’s distrust of governments and vigorous view of free expression.
Feldstein and Gordon conclude:
Law enforcement agencies already have a successful track record working with tech companies to blunt the reach of the Islamic State. There’s no reason why they can’t similarly work together against the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and other extremist groups today. Past experience should also calm fears that after their removal from Twitter and Facebook, extremists will now be even more effective at plotting schemes out of view. The case of the Islamic State suggests instead that collaborative partnerships between law enforcement and Telegram—as well as other encrypted apps like Signal—can be effective in driving violent extremists from the internet and quashing their public calls for violence.
