Kyiv, 29 April 2024 (TDI): Ukraine’s security chatbots were unblocked on Monday by Telegram. Ukraine said the Telegram messaging app had restored access to several chatbots that were used to collect information about Russia’s war effort after the services were briefly suspended.
The Dubai-based Telegram app founded by Russian-born Pavel Durov blocked several bots used by Ukraine to fight back against Russia’s full-scale invasion, Kyiv’s military spy agency GUR reported.
Chatbots, automated programs designed to interact with users via text or speech, play a crucial role in modern communication strategies, offering efficiency and scalability in disseminating information and providing assistance.
In national security, chatbots serve as valuable tools for intelligence gathering, threat analysis, and crisis management, enabling security services to respond swiftly and effectively to emerging threats.
The Centre for Strategic Communication announced in the morning that three bots, utilized by Ukraine’s SBU security service, GUR, and digital ministry for wartime operations, had been reinstated.
The GUR had said that “management of the Telegram platform unreasonably blocked several official bots that have opposed Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine, including the (GUR) bot”.
A Telegram spokesperson said bots were “temporarily disabled due to a false positive but have since been reinstated”, without giving further details.
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Recently, the founder of Telegram revealed that Apple had issued an official request concerning modifications related to “general news and propaganda” channels accessible to users in Ukraine.
He reiterated the company’s commitment to banning accounts and bots engaged in collecting coordinates for targeting strikes or posting personal information with calls to violence.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy shares his daily video addresses via the app, and his armed forces utilize it to alert citizens about incoming airstrikes and to document developments on the battlefield.
