Telegram: a 5-minute privacy setup

The guides below are drafts: a lawyer has not reviewed them yet. This is not legal advice.

Draft Safety

For everyone using Telegram in Russia, Belarus or Central Asia, or chatting with people there.

In Russia Telegram was restricted from August 2025 and almost fully blocked by 10 April 2026 (Meduza, citing OONI). Keep a way to reach your lawyer and family outside Telegram.
Hide your number: Settings → Privacy and Security → Phone Number: 'Nobody' can see it, only 'My Contacts' can find you by it.
Turn on Two-Step Verification (cloud password) with a password you use nowhere else.
Check Settings → Devices, end unknown sessions and set old sessions to end automatically.
Set an app passcode and use auto-delete for sensitive chats.

Forwarded messages: Nobody. Calls → peer-to-peer: Nobody (hides your IP). Invites: My Contacts.
Turn off contact sync and delete synced contacts.
Use secret chats (not available in every app, e.g. not in Telegram Desktop) for what matters most: they are not stored in Telegram's cloud.
For trips to Russia or Belarus use a separate account: signing in to your main one brings back every channel and chat.

Never share a login code, not even with 'support' or 'rights defenders'.
Don't react, send Stars or comment in channels of organisations designated extremist, terrorist or undesirable. Criminal cases have been opened over Stars.
Don't install 'improved' Telegram versions from forwarded links.
If a case has been opened, a report drawn up or your phone seized, don't delete anything without a lawyer: deletion can be used against you and won't remove what the authorities have already copied.

Regular chats, groups, channel lists, reactions and comments are stored on Telegram's servers.
Since September 2024 Telegram's privacy policy says it may disclose a suspect's IP address and phone number to authorities on a court order.

Situations this guide covers