Telegram made it official that it has offered a security fix to non-encrypted chats that were previously vulnerable to cyber attacks through manipulated bots. The chat services provider announced that the fix will be rolled in an automated manner and expects to put an end to all media speculations that its ‘Secret Chat’ feature that is not encrypted by default is exposed to hackers.
At the end of June 2021, a group of security researchers working for Royal Holloway, University of London, found that hackers could exploit the secret chats feature of Telegram through manipulated bots that can extract plaintext or any form of messagesÂ
Although all messages are encrypted on Telegram, the MTProto encryption is not available by default, as users need to opt-in for the end-to-end encryption. The said protocol works similar to TLS security layer and can protect users from man-in-the-middle attacks, but not from automated servers that could read text completely.
Hence, what the Telegram users need to do? Just update their app with the latest version from the App Store or Play Store and make sure that the service doesn’t allow hackers’ target devices.
Note- Found in the year 2013, Telegram happens to be an application meant to share messages, files, videos and photos- all in an encrypted form. The app reportedly has a monthly active user base of 500 million and is downloaded worldwide by users to send text or voice messages, make video or audio calls, share files, and location along with contacts and animated stickers. This American bound application software is now being dubbed as a competition to WhatsApp application that is owned by social media giant Facebook.
