Telegram app in Russia

pglushkov · 28 Apr 2018, 10:35

Hello all!
As some of you may know, in Russia our wise and beloved government blocked access to Telegram app and its servers due to some ridiculous accusations of breaking some ridiculous laws. AFAIK Telegram team had already been preparing to such events and gave users ability to specify proxy-servers to which one can connect to gain access to the Telegram servers again. However I could not find anything like that in any settings of Telegram App on Ubuntu Touch. I wanted to ask the community, maybe there's some config file on filesystem that I can modify and put the address of proxy for connection somewhere there?

From Russia with love Thank you!

flohack · 28 Apr 2018, 11:16

@pglushkov Hello, sorry to say, the App does not have this feature ATM. And we are working on a rewrite, but this will take longer time.

BR Florian

advocatux · 28 Apr 2018, 16:19

@pglushkov meanwhile the Telegram rewrite is done you could route all your data traffic using a VPN.

pglushkov · 28 Apr 2018, 16:46

Thanks for your replies! Good to know that you are aware of this problem! Any ETA on this one? Maybe some help in testing is required?
Regarding the VPN - of course I know of this possibility, I'm considering this option.

advocatux · 29 Apr 2018, 07:14

@pglushkov it's not possible to state an ETA for now.

The code and the known issues are here https://github.com/ubports/telegram-app

A Former User · 30 Apr 2018, 21:15

@pglushkov It looks like Iran are going to try to block Telegram now too: https://www.engadget.com/2018/04/30/iran-tells-isps-to-block-telegram/

pglushkov · 30 Apr 2018, 21:16

Yeap, just read it in the news funny and sad at the same time

UKPhil · 2 May 2018, 07:12

Oh dear it seems like everyone has it in for Telegram. Why though, is it because it is secure? A few things that I am thinking while reading this thread. 1 should we continue investing lots of dev time in an app that more and more may not be able to use? When you say use a VPN, should we not make easier to add vpn services, in particular the top popular ones. Also if testing is needed I am more than happy to proved my services if it will speed things up a little.

pglushkov · 2 May 2018, 09:42

Hi!
Regarding investing into Telegram - one could have used something else, but apart from Tg there really is nothing else that easy and pleasant to use as Tg on Ubuntu Touch. It's fast, it gives nice quick files sharing feature, it support channels. Skype is slow and clumsy (no offense to the developers of WEB version !! I do realize how difficult that is to make a quick responsive web-app especially when some many interface elements are around). WhatsApp cannot be logged-in without going through a QR-code. Signal might be ok, but too few people are using it.
I don't think that majority of UT users are in Russia and Iran (BTW statistics on this would be cool to see!), I thought it's mostly Europe. I didn't hear that Europe is on the war-path with Tg, so investing time into this app seems quite logical to me. And if Tg support team have some time along the way to add support for blocking-mitigation features - that would be great

A Former User · 2 May 2018, 09:48

I'm wondering if the way forward is Matrix, @pglushkov - we have the uMaticks app...

pglushkov · 2 May 2018, 09:53

Pardon my arrogance, but what is Matrix?

advocatux · 2 May 2018, 12:23

@pglushkov Matrix is "an open network for secure, decentralized communication."

See https://matrix.org/blog/home/ and this is the app https://open-store.io/app/umatriks.larreamikel

A Former User · 2 May 2018, 13:33

@advocatux I was going to say "It's the next level in the international cat-and-mouse game, called Your Right To Privacy", but I guess your description's more useful.