Telegram has just starred in a surprising script turn. One in which privacy loses

Telegram announced these days that predictably will integrate Grok in its application This summer. We will have the ability to use a chatbot of AI inside the messaging app, which is precisely the same as the goal has driven to Integrate goal AI In WhatsApp recently. The strategic alliance is striking, but also worrying.

A juicy agreement. After the announcement of Pavel Durov, CEO of Telegram, Elon Musk I clarified that the agreement was not yet signed. Durov replied that only some formalities remained. If it is finally confirmed, XAI will pay 300 million dollars to Telegram in cash and shares. Telegram will also take 50% of the revenues of Grok subscriptions that are sold via the messaging app. Everything seems fantastic for Telegram, but what will Musk win?

Data are a treasure. This agreement allows Grok to immediate access to a massive user base, part of which can become payment subscribers of the XAI IA service. But above all, it will allow Elon Musk’s company to obtain access to a massive data collection that can be used to train their AI models, for example. The same happens with goal and the inclusion of goal AI in WhatsApp: the conversations we have with the chatbot are not encrypted, and can serve among other things to train the company’s models.

Musk already did something similar with x. Just two months ago Elon Musk made a strategic play and fused X with Xai. The operation was logical, especially after Grok’s initial integration in X, but that strengthened even more a forceful reality: that the data of X users could be used to Train XAI AI models. Taking into account that Musk had been Looking for a plan B For data scarcity, that operation and the agreement with Telegram demonstrate that voracious hunger of data.

Hardov’s promises. In a tweet after the ad, Durov expressed his Commitment to privacy. “The user’s privacy is essential,” he said, adding that “to be clear, XAI will only access the data that Telegram users explicitly share with Grok through direct interactions. It’s expected: you can’t send messages to anyone (not even a chatbot) without sharing what you write.” That last sentence showed again that by default Telegram does not figure the messages. If users are concerned about their privacy, they must be attentive to this circumstance. As a security expert explained in a 2016 study, “Telegram is not safe“

Telegram and privacy. For years Telegram grew precisely because of its theoretical focus on the privacy of its users. It was one of the first to announce the use of extreme-a-extreme encryption (E2E, end-to-end). However, even that option He had small print. Not many users realized that in reality E2E encryption only applied in secret chats to, according to those responsible, that they would not raise suspicions.

Yielding data to governments. Things worsened in September 2024. That was when Telegram CEO, Pavel Durov, announced that would provide users with governments to be asked, although in reality the service conditions They already opened that door long before. Changes in these policies were produced After the controversial detention that Durov had suffered in France a few days before. The measure was especially surprising, especially considering that Telegram had become famous for Resist those same interference by the government of Russia. In January 2025 it was revealed how Telegram had yielded data from thousands of users to the United States authorities. We have just known that then they have continued yielding many more.

Changing headquarters. An analysis of the security and privacy of Telegram carried out by ESET He revealed the deficiencies in these areas and in the protection of anonymity, but also pointed out another important detail: Telegram has changed several times of jurisdiction and its headquarters has been traveling from Berlin to London, then to Singapore and finally Dubai. The objective was to maintain its independence, but that leaves an ambiguous legal framework on data management.

Bad news for privacy. All this makes the suspicions about the privacy guarantees offered by Telegram to its users are harmed. XAI is an American company, and the already revealed data assignments to that government by Telegram only reinforce a worrying trend.

Image | Steve Jurvetson

In Xataka | Telegram is much more than a messaging app. It has become the new Deep Web