�鶹��

Available for over a year

Several months ago, the �鶹��'s cyber correspondent Joe Tidy went onto the messaging app Telegram to investigate a story. Soon afterwards, he found he had been added to a Telegram channel focused on selling drugs. A short time later, he was added to one about hacking and then one about stolen credit cards. His Telegram settings had made it possible for people to add him to channels without him doing anything. Within a few months, he was a member of 82 groups - dozens of which were illegal. This series of events got him thinking about how Telegram operates - especially in light of the recent arrest in France of the company's billionaire chief executive. Pavel Durov is being investigated for suspected complicity in allowing illicit transactions, drug trafficking, fraud and the spread of child sex abuse images to flourish on his site. (Image: Getty)