In this project by LIGA.net, you will find answers to the following questions:

First — we will tell and show what Telegram has become by 2020: how the service is used in different countries all over the world, how this platform is abused, how it is related to people's safety (terrorist organizations use the service).

Second — we will show how the network of pro-Russian channels operates in Ukraine. Using data analysis, we will demonstrate a clear interconnection between the so-called Ukrainian channels with channels affiliated with the Kremlin. You will see how the narratives from Russia get into the Ukrainian information field. And who contributes to this.

Third — the end of the experiment: we are the authors of one of the most popular anonymous Telegram channels in Ukraine dedicated to the flat Earth "theory". We have 20,000 readers and 25,000 post views. We spent US $200 and less than an hour on our experiment. Now you will find out how easy it is to become an influential anonymous channel. And how people use it.

Fourth — we show how the market for anonymous Telegram channels works. One of the former administrators tells how much he earned, how much it costs to maintain the channel, and what it looks like from the inside.

Pavel Durov launched Telegram in 2013. Prior to this, he created and developed the VKontakte social network in Russia, which has been controlled by Mail.ru Group of the Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov since 2014. Durov said that the pressure from the security officials forced him to sell his stake in VK. The new owners claim that the put option was signed back in 2012.

Telegram is a secretive company. The journalists obtained most of the information about the messenger not from the company itself, but from the report of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (they interrogated Durov in the case regarding the launch of his cryptocurrency Gram). For example, according to the report, the messenger was developed using Durov's personal money and the investments of a private investor from Buffalo, New York.

Most members of the Telegram developers team, according to the FAQ section inside the service, are native to St. Petersburg. The office itself operates in the United Arab Emirates, where Durov moved his team after trying to settle in Berlin, London, and Singapore. However, the messenger publishes no output data — it is impossible to contact the office, get there, and verify this information. The company's office may still be located in St. Petersburg just as well.

At the same time, according to the information of the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Telegram is legally registered in the British Virgin Islands. The number of monthly users as of October 2019 was approximately 300 mn people worldwide, according to the same report. "According to Telegram's in-house estimates, at least 500,000 new users join the messenger daily," the report said.

Telegram has been repeatedly delaying the launch of its own cryptocurrency Gram, due to the claims of the American commission. The representatives of the commission would like to give the messenger's tokens the same status as that of securities, but they are not registered in accordance with the US law. Durov does not agree with such approach. Due to problems with the launch, he may have to return the invested US $1.7 bn to his investors.

In the early stages of Telegram's "life", WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum accused Durov of plagiarism. But such "promotion" played into the Russian's hands, and Telegram started gaining popularity. In 2013, Durov promised US $200,000 for the decryption of his correspondence in the messenger. In the following years, Durov was "selling" the thesis on the security and super reliability of Telegram. Also, he attacked WhatsApp on several occasions, urging to delete the messenger from the phones, allegedly because of its vulnerability to hackers.

Durov's ex-colleague Anton Rosenberg, former Telegram director of special projects, argued the super reliability in an interview with GQ: "Frankly, this (messenger security) is a myth invented by Durov himself". For example, the two-factor authentication in Telegram was developed just in April 2015, but was left optional even after a series of high-profile hacks, according to Rosenberg.

Telegram is popular in undemocratic and poor countries. This is confirmed by the 2019 report of the We Are Social international agency, according to which Durov's messenger is most popular in Ethiopia, Iran, and Uzbekistan.

Quartz Africa explains the phenomenon of its popularity in Ethiopia with the availability of Telegram. The country has a government monopoly on all mobile Internet services, and it is more profitable for locals to download Telegram, which has a size of approximately half of that of WhatsApp. Ethiopian residents are also attracted by the opportunity to create groups of up to 200,000 members, which contributes to political activity. In WhatsApp, group chats can include only up to 256 people.

Hong Kong was the last international point of growth in the number of Telegram users. In July 2019 alone, when the mass protests began, more than 100,000 new users were added to the application, according to Sensor Tower. And this happened despite Telegram's official ban in China.

Also, Durov's messenger is popular among terrorists. They promote Islamism, recruit new members, raise money, incite violence and coordinate terrorist attacks, according to the report by the non-governmental Counter Extremism Project (CEP).

"The flexible interface makes it possible for the extremists to do everything: from self-promotion, brand development and the dissemination of propaganda, to secret planning of attacks without detection or intervention by law enforcement agencies," the report said. In particular, the platform was used by terrorists of the Islamic State.

In September 2015, Durov denied the allegations, saying that "the right to privacy is more important than the fear of terrorism". Two months after the statement, ISIS carried out terrorist attacks in Paris, which killed 130 people and injured more than 350. The group used Telegram to coordinate and plan attacks, according to French investigators.

This forced Durov to change his approach. Today, he assures that the messenger's administration is doing everything possible to suppress terrorism. Telegram has created the ISIS Watch channel, which daily reports on the amounts of deleted prohibited terrorist content: in January, the messenger blocked almost 25,000 bots and channels.

At the same time, Durov's company does not block Telegram channels of terrorist organizations in DPR and LPR.

The CEP still documents cases of using Telegram for extremist purposes. In particular, mass migration of ultra-right organizations to the messenger was noted. In October 2019, CEP established that in 65 far-right Telegram channels the number of users per month increased by 43 %.

In Russia, Telegram has become the main information platform for mud-slinging, stovepiping, and manipulation. LIGA.net contacted the journalists in the Project publication. They conducted a major investigation into the use of Telegram in the Russian Federation, revealing the connection of anonymous channels to the Russian authorities (Kremlin Telegram. The story of Russian authorities turning Telegram into TV).

The phenomenon of Telegram's popularity in the Russian Federation is explained by the Project's First Deputy Editor-in-Chief Mikhail Rubin: "There was a situation when people, including Russian politicians, lacked a platform to leak information. And Kremlin curators discovered such a popular platform as Telegram. At the end of 2016, it was the leader in publication of fake insider information. And everyone read it".

Moreover, he added, no one paid attention that occasionally such "insider information" was stolen from newspapers, or those were "totally crazy" conspiracy theories from political scientists. The Kremlin saw that and realized "it had to join the medium".

It was the Kremlin that did the most for the popularity of the messenger, according to IT expert, former Deputy Minister of Information Policy of Ukraine Dmitry Zolotukhin.

In 2017, an epic with an attempt to block Telegram began in Russia. Allegedly, the messenger was used by the suspects in the explosion in the St. Petersburg underground, and therefore Durov was required to provide keys for decrypting the correspondence. Durov refused. After that, Russian authorities attempted to block Telegram, justified by the need to deprive the terrorists of the communication channel.

"But why just the Telegram? Why not other messengers? Why not the secret chats on Facebook?" — Zolotukhin asks, considering the story with the blocking unnatural.

He believes that Durov is cunning when speaking of confrontation with the FSB and the Kremlin. "There are reasons to believe that Durov officially says that he does not care about all the requirements for placing servers in the Russian Federation, but unofficially continues to cooperate with the authorities," Zolotukhin stated in a commentary to LIGA.net.

While in the past everyone turned to tabloids to "kill off their opponents", these days Telegram has occupied this niche, according to Rubin. At the same time, a Russian official may pay for blocking, so that the discrediting information is not published.

The profit of anonymous users in Russia (per one post in terms of UAH): approx. UAH 40,000 on such channels as NEZYGAR, above UAH 12,000 on channels having over 50,000 subscribers, above UAH 2,000 on small channels having 20,000 subscribers.

Channels charge money for each post. "We can write that our opponent eats babies for breakfast and take it to the Telegram channels, which are most likely to post this. The cost is the only issue," Rubin says.

The Kremlin still uses Telegram to discredit persona non grata, Rubin mentions. At the same time, in view of the low confidence in the information published on anonymous channels, the authorities decided to invest in the promotion of channels of famous personalities.

A typical example is when the Russian propagandist, head of Russia Today Margarita Simonyan, joined Telegram. "The people in charge of Telegram in the Kremlin took part in the promotion of her channel and herded it with subscribers," Rubin says.

In general, the journalist calls the situation in the Russian Telegram "surrealistic". "We have intertwined people who work as journalists in state-owned media and people who deal with Telegram. Often those are the same people," Rubin adds.

The most popular political channel in the Russian Federation is Stalingulag — 482,000 subscribers. In May 2019, the author of the channel revealed his identity: it turned out that the channel was run by a 27-year-old Internet trader Aleksandr Gorbunov. Zolotukhin does not believe it was done at the behest of the author.

"I believe it was an agreement with political heavyweights, which attracted even more attention to Telegram. And the analysis of the channel content shows that the author, on the one hand, criticizes the Russian authorities, but, on the other hand, fully supports the annexation of Crimea and spreads fakes about the fire in the House of Trade Unions in Odessa," the expert says.

One of the most famous Russian channels NEZYGAR (280,000 subscribers) remains anonymous. Journalists at Project connect it with Vladislav Klyushin, the owner of the Katyusha media monitoring system used by the Ministry of Defence and the Presidential Administration of Russia.

And we will need this information in the next part of our article.

We asked the representatives the Security Service of Ukraine for a comment. They said in a conversation with LIGA.net that the special services of the Russian Federation use Telegram to disseminate dirt and fakes — and the Service keeps these records. The objective of the Russians is to artificially aggravate the situation in Ukraine.

Another source in the Security Service of Ukraine stated that the so-called Ukrainian anonymous Telegram channels are divided into two types: locally administered (Ukrainian phone numbers), as well as those using Swiss, Swedish and other phone numbers outside the reach of the Ukrainian special services.

The source mentioned a recent special operation in Kyiv as an example of work in the "first category," when the Security Service of Ukraine busted a bot farm arranged by Russian citizens with the assistance of the displaced people from the Donbass.

The group registered anonymous Telegram accounts, helped spread misinformation with the objective of "reducing confidence in government institutions".

In addition, the source in the special services said, the Russians were actively using doppelganger phone numbers. "They make an SIM card with a number. For example, yours. And even after checking the number, I will be sure I am texting you in Telegram," the source said.

We also asked the Ukrainian Cyberpolice for a commentary. Its representatives told LIGA.net they constantly monitored Telegram channels. Many of them sell hacked databases and arrange cyberattacks. At the same time, Pavel Durov's administration is obviously not helping to deal with these phenomena — the cyberpolice, as well as the authors of this material, do not have direct contacts with the Telegram office.

Thanks to the Tgstat resource, we have identified ten most popular anonymous channels in Ukraine. Their total coverage in 2019 was more than 166 mn views. This does not mean that each post is seen by millions — views of all posts are summarized. At the same time, views are easily purchased, just like subscribers and voting cheat sheets (we will talk about that later).

Many anonymous channels are linked. This link is easy to follow thanks to reposts / mentions / recommendations on the channel. For example, the Razvedchik channel reposts Legitimny channel entries on a regular basis. Both channels are pseudo-Ukrainian. But they have a lot in common (both in content and in those who made these channels popular).

To study the links between channels based on reposts, we analysed all publications on 14 channels, both anonymous and with publicly known authors: Dubinsky.pro, Temny Ritsar, Max Buzhansky, Rezident, Legitimny, Zhenshchina S Kosoi, Razvedchik, Bely Ritsar, Tainy Deputata, Dzhoker, Trubu Prorvalo, Krokodil, Sorosyata, and Sheptun.

Here is a map of reposts of the Ukrainian and pseudo-Ukrainian Telegram segment, which we compiled using network analysis (based on Tgstat data). Here are the channels whose posts have been reposted more than once by one of our 14 analysed individuals. Try not to get confused. Below, we will focus on the individual relationships that interested us.

In total, 125 Telegram channels are included in our network. Of these, about 30 are geolocated in Russia. Another 20 are pseudo-Ukrainian. At the same time, all the channels of the network, including the Russian ones, are somehow interconnected. To put it simply, the pseudo-Ukrainian Legitimny may not be directly linked to the Kremlin's Nezygar. But through reposts it relays the Russian narrative.

EXAMPLE. Razvedchik channel. When the channel had 200 subscribers, it was recommended by the Kremlin's Nezygar. And it made it famous. Later, the channel with a pro-Kremlin origin reposted the allegedly Ukrainian channel Sheptun (36) and totally Russian VRUB (30) almost the same number of times. Razvedchik reposted the Kremlevsky Bezbashennik Russian channel nine times. In fact, Razvedchik may even belong to a Ukrainian citizen, and may be registered to a Ukrainian SIM card. But content-wise, it supports and disseminates Kremlin narratives.

ANOTHER EXAMPLE. Legitimny channel reposted Kremlevsky Bezbashennik four times. Legitimny has a close relationship with such channels as Rezident (68 reposts) and Zhenshchina S Kosoi (67 reposts).

OTHER EXAMPLES. On the link map, you can see an independent group of three channels: Bely Ritsar, Pravda Kachury and Derenyuga. Pravda Kachury is the channel of the Servant of the People MP Aleksandr Kachura, and the Bely Ritsar posts flattering reviews of the current government and is the antagonist of the Temny Ritsar, which criticizes the government.

Much can be said by the "first announcement" — the one who made the channel popular in the first place (as in the case of Nezygar, which brought Razvedchik into the narrative). We found out which popular channels were the first to repost the messages of the Temny Ritsar, the Legitimny, and others.

Temny Ritsar. The channel was reposted for the first time by the MPs from the Servant of the People party Maxim Buzhansky and Aleksandr Dubinsky, as well as the Politicus channel, which is run by journalist Sergei Lyamets. It is noteworthy that the among the popular channels, Dubinsky.pro was the only one to repost Lyamets. By the way, Dubinsky was among the first (along with Igor Mosiychuk, Temny Ritsar, and Anatoly Shariy) to repost the Dzhoker.

Thanks to the analysis of the first reposts, the connection of "Ukrainian channels" Legitimny, Zhenshchina S Kosoi, Sheptun and Rezident becomes obvious. For example, the first serious contribution to the popularity of the Legitimny was made by the Zhenshchina S Kosoi, Sheptun and the channel of ex-official in the days of Yanukovych Klymenko Time (Aleksandr Klimenko hiding in Russia, last seen in Moscow). The Rezident was first reposted by the Legitimny and the Zhenshchina S Kosoi.

We have created conditional groups in Ukrainian Telegram. For this infographics, we have analysed who reposted whom, who mentioned whom and recommended to read (at least once). Key conclusion: pseudo-Ukrainian channels are a gasket between the outspoken Kremlin and public channels in Ukraine. We will provide examples below.

Yet, Telegram will not replace other media. Some things which, for example, Anatoly Shariy does not repost himself — are reposted by his website. Therefore, it is significant which of the online media refer to the largest pseudo-Ukrainian channels and, thus, retransmits the Russian narrative while simultaneously drawing readers into the network of Russian channels.

EXAMPLE. The Legitimny channel regularly becomes a news source for Shariy.net (at least 10 times). And the Rezident and Razvedchik channels relay the Znaj.ua website, which regularly praises Viktor Medvedchuk and violates journalism standards.

Now, let us go back to December, 2019. NEZYGAR recommended its subscribers to subscribe to Legitimny, the posts of which it also reposts on a regular basis. In turn, the channel essentially recommended by the Kremlin was reposted 16 times by Shariy on his page. Bottom line: it takes just two clicks to infiltrate the Kremlin's narratives into Ukrainian information space.

We have taken one obvious example. But that is how almost all the analysed channels operate: the Kremlin's narrative — the liner — the public broadcast and the entry into the Ukrainian media space.

WHO IS BEHIND THE CHANNELS? Through the example of Klymenko Time. Aleksandr Klimenko is the former Minister of Revenue and Collections in the government of Viktor Yanukovych. In February 2014, Klimenko fled Ukraine, and a wanted notice was issued. According to law enforcement officials, Klimenko and his associated businesses have caused damages to the national budget worth approx. UAH 6 bn.

In 2018, Klimenko was spotted by journalists in Moscow at a lecture by journalist Yury Dud. The ex-official has been constantly trying to get back into Ukrainian politics and even created for the purpose the Successful Ukraine party, but for two years he has not been engaged in promotion of either his personal blogs, or his own party. He is just involved with the Telegram channel and an eponymous pseudo-media YouTube channel.

Next, we will focus on several channels and tell about their connections in detail. And then we will explain how it all works from the inside, how anonymous channels are administered, what are the tasks, and how much it costs.

LIGA.net talked to the author of a network of Ukrainian Telegram channels, who told about their operation on condition of anonymity.

"This fall, I was approached by an acquaintance of mine, who offered me to work as an author on three anonymous channels. I had to provide the content, they were dealing with promotion," the source says, who wrote for such channels for about two months.

The first channel was a news channel — without much distortion, the source says. The second channel — the pro-government one — was supposed to look like "inside information from Bankova St.". The third channel was supposed to be an oppositional one.

Two or three authors worked on all three channels, we were paid US $1,000 a month. The scheme to writing posts was approximately as follows: 33 % — true, 33 % — half-true, and the remaining 33 % — fake. The managers cited the Russian NEZYGAR as an example of content, the source said.

At first, the organizers promote the channel with bots and bring the number of subscribers to a more or less significant figure. Then the money is invested in promotion: they pay popular channels for the publication of links to the public. A person follows the link, sees that more than 10,000 people have already subscribed to the channel and thinks: "Am I not as good as those guys? I would also like to read insider information with the others". Although they do not realize that in most cases, 50-60 % of subscribers are just SIM cards.

So, you still do not believe that everything is that simple? In the next part of the article we will show how for mere US $200 one can create a popular anonymous Telegram channel in Ukraine. We did it (hopefully you are not one of its subscribers).

Both Russian and Ukrainian anonymous channels operate based on the same scheme: primary promotion by bots and driving up the number of views to create the effect of popularity of the channel. Then — advertising the channel on the related sites. LIGA.net decided to experiment and create a popular anonymous Telegram channel. How long will it take and how expensive is it? The only thing we did not do was that we did not order advertisements in other public accounts. Although many agreed to advertise us.

One can buy not only subscribers and views. The voting cheating also works (you just have to choose the option that you need to drive up). One can buy "package offers" when 10,000 to 20,000 views will be automatically added to each post on your channel within one hour after posting plus 5,000 subscribers per day for each subsequent post (for example, the next 15). One can also create a package for their own purposes and create the most popular public in Ukraine. 100,000 subscribers? Your wallet is the only limit.

Those lazy to come up with the name and content of the channel can easily order all-inclusive services. We called one of the agencies and asked how much it would cost to create a channel from scratch, fill it with content, and promote it constantly. We chose 50,000 subscribers as a target. The answer was: creation of the channel and its content — up to UAH 25,000, ads — US $600-800 monthly. A political anonymous channel will cost more. On average — US $5,000-8,000 monthly, say the sources of the media familiar with the market.

How much can one make on Telegram advertising? The cost of advertising depends on the number of subscribers. The largest domestic channel Ukraine 24/7 (462,000 subscribers) will post an ad for UAH 9,000. Since the beginning of the year, one can find at least ten posts suggestive of advertising (this is approx. UAH 90,000) on the channel. On another major channel, Ukraina V Shoke (204,000 subscribers), ads are placed for UAH 3,000. The number of subscribers looks fantastic. How many of these people are bots, one can only guess (by comparison: Pavel Durov's Russian-speaking personal channel has just over 150,000 subscribers).

The Telegram itself is not scary. It becomes really dangerous when it is cited by traditional media. This is how leaked information and fake news are legitimized. For example, the Strana.ua website made Dzhoker popular, and the Gordon media recently launched a series of publications citing the anonymous channels — and it cites stovepiping by Legitimny, Rezident, and other pro-Kremlin public accounts. Thanks to some website editors and some TV channels, the Russian narrative entered the Ukrainian space. And it became commonplace.

Digital Communications and Internet Marketing Expert Alyona Denga shares her experience when TV channels made whole stories based on her post in Telegram. "It proves that one can write anything in a post and feed it to journalists," she adds.

Blocking Telegram is also a dubious decision. If Ukraine goes down the path of blocking, it will not change much, Zolotukhin believes: "When people have the task of constantly dragging through the mud, then they will do it regardless of Telegram's existence, and regardless of its anonymity."