Exclusive
As of: 01/26/2023 6:00 p.m
The messenger service Telegram rarely gives the necessary data to the police and judiciary to identify suspects. This shows research by WDR and SZ. Twitter is doing better.
No, nothing has actually changed at Telegram, according to Christoph Hebbecker’s sobering conclusion. “We just can’t get to Telegram”. Hebbecker works at the Cologne Public Prosecutor’s Office for Cybercrime (ZAC) and is responsible for combating hate crime on the Internet. And there are plenty of them on Telegram.
The messenger service has many millions of users worldwide. Oppositionists from Russia and Iran cavort here, but also right-wing extremists, Islamists and conspiracy ideologues. You can use the encrypted chat program to communicate, network, agitate and threaten largely anonymously.
This is a problem for prosecutors, because they often cannot find out who is spreading hate – or who is planning a terrorist attack. Just recently, two men were arrested in Castrop-Rauxel who are said to have planned an Islamist attack using toxins such as ricin. The US federal police FBI had come across suspicious chats on Telegram and then informed the German authorities.
Obliged to report and delete
According to the German Network Enforcement Act (NetzDG), the operators of social networks are obliged to report and delete criminal content – and to cooperate with the police and the judiciary. For example, if investigators want to have the inventory data to be able to identify a suspicious user, for example the e-mail address or telephone number with which the person registered.
Cooperation works quite well on some platforms such as Facebook, Instagram or TikTok. Telegram, however, is still considered a major problem, because the operators deliver almost no user data to German authorities. “We now know that it is very likely that we will not be able to identify a suspect because Telegram does not cooperate,” said Cologne public prosecutor Hebbecker. His authority therefore hardly conducts any procedures related to the messenger service.
Threats had no effect
After research by WDR and “Süddeutsche Zeitung”, the cooperation between Telegram and German prosecutors has hardly improved on this point. And this despite the fact that the Federal Ministry of the Interior and the Federal Ministry of Justice had significantly increased the pressure on the operating company last year. Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser even threatened to have Telegram switched off, while Justice Minister Marco Buschmann threatened a fine of millions.
There were then some direct talks between representatives of the Interior Ministry and the Telegram founder and boss, the Russian Pavel Durov. It was said that a willingness to cooperate had been signaled. Telegram even named a direct contact person for the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA). But little has happened since then.
Deletion requests from German authorities are now being implemented. By the beginning of this year, the BKA had reported criminal content to Telegram in 445 cases, and in 419 cases it was probably actually deleted. However, Telegram continues to provide hardly any inventory data for identifying suspected users.
“230 Outstanding Cases”
In “230 outstanding cases” the BKA has so far requested such data as e-mail or IP addresses. Only in just over 60 cases was there any reply at all, and only in 25 cases was data actually transmitted. Mostly it was about depictions of sexual abuse of children or Islamist terrorism. This means that the number of information provided to German authorities has not increased since the summer of last year. The platform did not answer a question as to why Telegram continues to publish data so rarely.
Last October, the Bonn Federal Office of Justice (BfJ) issued two fines totaling around 5.1 million euros. Telegram is now represented in Germany by a law firm that has lodged an objection to the fine. “The grounds for the objection are currently being examined by the Federal Office of Justice. A decision is being prepared,” said a spokesman for the Federal Ministry of Justice when asked.
Scientists should research effects
The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) has meanwhile addressed the question of how much social media such as Telegram contribute to the radicalization of people and how extremist content and conspiracy myths are introduced into society via such networks.
Last year, the newly founded Center for Analysis and Research (ZAF) of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution commissioned a research project for the first time. Scientists from the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich have been awarded the contract, they have examined the role of Telegram in online radicalization. The results of the study are expected to be published soon.
Surprised by Twitter
Despite all the problems in working with Telegram, there are also positive developments from the point of view of the prosecutors. When the entrepreneur Elon Musk bought the Twitter platform last year, there were great concerns that a legal vacuum could finally arise there. After all, Musk fired a large part of those employees who were responsible for finding and deleting criminal content. Musk also asked the Twitter community if there should be a “general amnesty” for previously blocked users.
“For a long time, cooperation on Twitter was catastrophic,” says public prosecutor Benjamin Krause from the Central Office for Combating Cybercrime (ZIT) at the Frankfurt am Main Public Prosecutor’s Office. But now things are going surprisingly well. “We don’t know why, but suddenly Twitter is sending data regularly.” In the past, investigators often received no response to a request, but now they almost always get useful information.