An investigation into Telegram communities across Spain and Italy uncovers how men are sharing and profiting from thousands of nonconsensual images of their girlfriends, wives, acquaintances, and former partners.
The AI Forensics investigation, Harassment as infrastructure, claims that the encrypted messaging platform is taking advantage of the same privacy features that millions rely on to create a structured, monetized, and largely automated ecosystem of abusive and nonconsensual images.
AI Forensics’ latest investigation reveals large-scale, organized Telegram networks involving nearly 25,000 users across Italy and Spain spreading and monetizing non-consensual intimate images (NCII), including child sexual abuse material (CSAM).
Drawing on 2.8 million messages across 16 groups and channels over six weeks, the investigation found:
Abuse is cross-border: 72% of Spanish content also appeared in Italian groups, with 8% of files circulating in both.
Perpetrators—usually young men—use Telegram’s infrastructure to organize and sell content.
Victims are largely women, often identifiable via shared links.
Content includes CSAM and depictions of incest and rape.
Monetization occurs via €20–€50 one-time fees or €5 per month subscriptions.
Nudifying bots scale synthetic NCII.
Content circulates across platforms, with TikTok, Instagram, and Reddit as key pipelines.
These findings highlight systemic platform failures. Stronger EU action is needed, including designating Telegram a VLOP under the DSA and addressing synthetic abuse in the AI Act.
Its not like Telgram as an organization, is involved in it.
Only that they use the Telegram app and server’s for it, which I think can’t be avoided without rolling out total surveillance.
I think a society should make the trade off to have some digital crime for the sake of having freedom and privacy
The report argues the ability of abuse sites on Telegram to generate advertising and revenue means that “it is not in the platform’s interest to proactively and aggressively moderate content.”
Telegram’s premium subscriptions generated $292 million, with the subscriber base growing to 15 million by May 2025.
Moreover, these groups are not E2EE, which means Telegram can see what goes on in there and hence has more power to do something about it. In his latest interview on a German podcast, Proton’s CEO talked about Telegram and its founder Pavel Durov.
Yen described Telegram’s attitude towards legal requests as “F the Police”. What Yen meant by this is that Telegram has a history of ignoring legal requests, which I believe is documented. They may be more collaborative now, but they are still not transparent with users or in their marketing.
If Signal had channels and allowed groups larger than 1000, they would likely have the same problem as Telegram. But they don’t, and I believe that was a smart decision, even though I am not against large group platforms being E2EE.
The other difference between Signal and Telegram is that Signal does not ignore legal requests.
All the people who use Telegram or any service to abuse and exploit women and children, deserve to get caught. But if bad laws are proposed in response to Telegram’s lax attitude toward abuse taking place on their platform, we could soon have another chat control.
The simple fact that Telegram has a history of ignoring request suggests that they are not serious about stopping abuse. If abuse websites can also generate advertising revenue through Telegram’s premium subscriptions that also suggests a lax attitude. I am not remotely convinced that Telegram is doing their best. Especially when I know that they have a history of deception.
CONTENT WARNING FOR SEXUAL ABUSE. 