Women's safety first, then free speech
I came across the news on Twitter that the founder of Telegram was arrested in France. According to Reuters, French police arrested him for the following reasons:
"Durov, who has dual French and United Arab Emirates citizenship, was arrested as part of a preliminary police investigation into allegedly allowing a wide range of crimes due to a lack of moderators on Telegram and a lack of cooperation with police, a French police source said."
Additionally, entrepreneurs and startup investors, including Elon Musk, posted tweets with the hashtag #FreePavel, demanding his release and criticizing the French government.
#freepavel hashtag list on X(formerly Twitter)
I've been thinking about. Many people want Pavel, who created Telegram, to be released. They say this is about protecting free speech. But I wonder: Is 'free speech' more important than the safety of women who are falling victim to sex crimes on Telegram at this very moment? If he is released, can we reduce the number of sexual abuse criminal victims? Or at least, is there an excellent plan to prevent these crimes?
From now on, I'm going to talk about some sexual abuse criminals that happened in Korea. These bad things happened on Telegram. To help people understand, I use articles from English newspapers.
Nth Room
Did you heard about 'Nth Room Sexual Abuse Scandal'? It occured in 2020.
Jalopnik
According to Quartz,
The Korea Cyber Sexual Violence Response Center also said that it has counted at least 260,000 users in 56 chat rooms where users shared extorted content, as well as spy-cam images or photos of female acquaintances. Some of the content was created by the users themselves, and included deep fake pornography.
One of the underage victims said she was extorted for over 40 sexual abuse videos while she was a middle school student in 2018.
She said
“I developed bipolar disorder and depression. I felt like I was being stalked. I couldn’t let anyone recognize me so I bundled up my whole face and body whenever I went outside, even in summer,”
By
Source: The New York Times
According to The New York Times,
Some estimates in the local news media say that up to 300,000 paying customers use these online chat rooms, in which operators go so far as to provide tailor-made footage for individual customers that often include extremely dehumanizing sex scenes, the police say.
On Wednesday, as it handed Mr. Cho over to prosecutors, the National Police Agency said it was revealing his identity because of what it called his “vicious and repetitive criminal method” in keeping 74 women, including 16 minors, in sexual “slavery.”
According to Hankyoreh(Korean media company),
According to a request asking for data from Telegram obtained by Democratic Party lawmaker Kim Young-bae from the National Police Agency in October 2020, the police sent seven requests to Telegram for over seven months to ask for their cooperation to investigate the Nth Room case, only to be snubbed.
The korean police had a hard time investigating because telegram be snubbed. A group called "Team Flame" (Choo-jeok-dan Bul-kkot) did a lot to catch the bad people. This group was made up of just two female college students. They went into Telegram chat rooms to find proof and then told the police about the bad people they found.
Netflix has produced a documentary based on this Sexual Abuse Scandal.
SNU alums nabbed for digital sex crimes on Telegram
In May 2024, another crime occurred on Telegram. The perpetrator is a Seoul National University graduate, and the victims are more than 60 current female students and women.
"Team Flame" (Choo-jeok-dan Bul-kkot) did again.
Police probe Telegram chat room sharing explicit photos of Inha University students
The chat room, active since 2020 with around 1,200 participants, was used to share sexually explicit images featuring digitally altered faces of female students. Participants also shared personal information of victims, such as phone numbers and addresses.
고나린
According to Hankyoreh,
In one Telegram channel with over 1,300 members, there were separate chat rooms for about 70 universities across the country. Members shared personal information about people they knew and made fake images without permission.
The sharing of these fake images was widespread and organized. They were shared repeatedly in chat rooms and even made into emojis for fun. Then they were shared in other Telegram rooms. A room with 3,700 members shared links to other rooms with fake images of specific people or students from certain women's colleges. Some rooms required sending 10 photos of someone you know to join.
There was even a channel targeting high school students, with over 2,340 members. This channel made and shared fake images of minors, which is a serious crime that can result in jail time even for just having or viewing these images.
Telegram sexual exploitation 'Older Sister Rooms' 'Mother Rooms'
신다인 기자
According to Women News(Korean media),
Controversy is spreading as Telegram group chats sharing 'deepfake sexual exploitation content' from middle schools, high schools, and universities have been uncovered, along with group chats where members shared footage of family members such as older sisters, younger sisters, and mothers. On social media platforms, a 'family #MeToo' movement is emerging, with individuals disclosing their experiences of familial sexual violence.
When we look at digital sex crimes in Korea, we see something really upsetting:
- Many men are sharing pictures and videos of women and girls without permission on Telegram.
- Some of these pictures and videos are fake, made using deepfake technology.
- The victims are strangers, students, and even family members.
- These crimes occured on Telegram.
How can we stop this?
- To use Telegram, you need a phone number with verification code.
- In Korea, phone numbers are linked to real names when you get.
- If Telegram gave these phone numbers to the police, they could find the perpetrators.
- But Telegram doesn't cooperate with police requests. This might be why French police arrested Telegram's founder.
Here's a question for you:
What's more important: letting people say whatever they want on Telegram, or keeping women safe from these crimes?
I think keeping women safe is more important. These are real people living around us. If someone gets hurt badly because of these crimes, does it matter if people can say whatever they want?
I believe Telegram can stop these crimes if they try. And remember, these sex crimes are not about free speech - they're just crimes.
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